Richard Burden: Violations of resolution 1701 are obviously unacceptable from whichever side they come. Therefore, would my right hon. Friend also care to comment on the large number of Israeli overflights of Lebanon, which also violate resolution 1701? What representations is she making on that, bearing it in mind that such overflights have been taking place since well before the events of this summer?

Margaret Beckett: There can be no certainty about the situation in Lebanon, and I share the concern that the hon. Gentleman has expressed. Certainly, the step that is being taken, with the clearly expressed wish of bringing down the elected Government, is potentially very damaging and destabilising. When I was in Lebanon, among the points I made to my many interlocutors were, first, that the international community supports the Government—whom the people of Lebanon themselves elected—and, secondly, that there are many pressing issues and problems on the plate of that Government and of the Lebanese people in reconstructing their country, and that that should surely be their top priority.

Gerald Kaufman: Since the Israeli soldiers remain captive four months after a war that devastated large parts of Lebanon and killed huge numbers of Lebanese civilians—and Israeli civilians, too—does that not make the visit of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister to Washington this week all the more important in terms of emphasising that none of these problems can be solved without an overall settlement in the middle east?

Kim Howells: I have met the Governments of key debt holders and urged them to consider the long-term benefits of reducing the burden of Saddam Hussein's legacy, including the financial burden. As part of the Paris club creditors' agreement, the United Kingdom has agreed to forgive 80 per cent. of the Iraqi debt to the UK. Other countries have also slashed Iraqi debt, but some—especially among Iraq's Arab neighbours—have declined to do so. We continue to encourage others to follow our lead in order to help significantly with the vital reconstruction of the Iraqi economy.

Kim Howells: We have made it clear to the Paris creditors' club that this debt burden is a significant hindrance to the reconstruction of Iraq. However, I should point out that many honest businesses and countries suffered as a consequence of Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait—not least the Kuwaitis themselves. I am sure that in a perfect world we could bring this situation to early closure, and we have to convince those Governments and companies that that is the right thing to do. Believe me, some of those Governments and companies feel extremely bitter about the losses that occurred as a consequence of Saddam Hussein's illegal action.

Margaret Beckett: Lots of discussions have taken place with the Iraqi Government about a transfer of responsibility, but I have detected no interest in the Iraqi Government in finding a new international force. Perhaps I could remind my hon. Friend, as she seems to have forgotten, that the multinational forces that are there are there under the authority of the United Nations. The Iraqi Government are not interested in getting in a fresh set of international troops, but there is certainly interest in taking over control of security themselves—that is a view that we strongly share.
	Let me add that it is not the case that the presence of multinational forces is fuelling conflict in every part of Iraq—there are some areas where it may not be assisting and may even be adding to difficulties, but that is not so across Iraq. That is why the Iraqi Government are not asking for those forces simply to decamp.

Margaret Beckett: The advice that the Prime Minister will give to President Bush is exactly the advice that he has shared with the House, and indeed the country, on many occasions. It is on the need to give attention to supporting the Iraqi Government's efforts to improve services and infrastructure, and to improve and take greater responsibility for security, as they can. Obviously, it is not entirely up to me how matters are reported to the House, but I certainly give the right hon. Gentleman an undertaking that if there is a change that seems to require fresh information to be given to the House, I will be happy to give it, in one way or another.

Margaret Beckett: They are part of the problem now. I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister will discuss with the President a whole range of matters, which will encompass the points rightly raised by my hon. Friend. It has long been clear—and, of late, we have made it explicitly clear—to, for example, the Syrians that people are prepared to talk to them, and that it is in their interests, and in the interests of Iran, and all of Iraq's other neighbours, that there should be a stable Iraq in the future. They might think about that a little more fully than they seem to do at the moment. Of course, although people are prepared to engage in dialogue—I am pleased, for example, that the Syrians are opening an embassy in Baghdad—the degree and the nature of that dialogue will depend on whether or not action is taken by both Syria and Iran that shows good will, as opposed to ill will.

Kim Howells: My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister visited the region from 9 to 11 September, and he met key leaders. He believed that it was important to visit the region to exchange ideas and to start to identify a way forward for the parties, as that can lead to genuine dialogue through negotiations and a way back to the road map. I do not doubt that he will urge our American allies to devote more energy to that re-engagement in his impending visit to Washington.
	My right hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen (Mr. Murphy) recently visited Sri Lanka, and he put his finger on an important issue in peace building and efforts to reinvigorate the procedure. He noted that it is not enough for the parties to be brought together once every six months in Geneva—it is something that must be worked at day and night, as was the case under Prime Minister Major. People must construct back channels, and explore ways to bring the sides together. It is about peace building, and those are not easy techniques to evolve. We should not assume that it is enough to hold the occasional grand meeting at which the great and the good are brought together and various resolutions are arrived at. We have to do much more, as it is about building peace from the bottom up.

Chris McCafferty: Given that Kofi Annan has, amongst other things, called for a freeze pending the ban, and given that the expert-led urgent discussions will not report back to the review for a whole year, I urge the Government not only to attend the Oslo conference, but to take a lead part in discussions on a possible moratorium and, ultimately, a ban on these utterly abhorrent weapons.

Ian McCartney: Immediately following North Korea's nuclear test in October, the Foreign Secretary had telephone conversations with her counterparts, including the Chinese Foreign Minister Li. I also called the Democratic People's Republic of Korea ambassador in London to the Foreign Office to make our views clear. On a previous visit to the region in July, I discussed the issues with interlocutors from China, as well as Japan and South Korea, and my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister had further talks during his visit in October. We remain in direct and regular contact with the Chinese Government on the issue, including through our ambassador in Beijing and via other high-level ministerial and official contacts. China has an instrumental role to play in the resumption of the six-party talks and in ensuring that North Korea complies with UN Security Council resolution 1718.

Jeremy Hunt: Does the Minister accept that the situation in North Korea is a perfect illustration of why it is vital that we renew our nuclear deterrent? Does he agree that the argument that we are unlikely to use such a deterrent is not only wrong but dangerous when we are faced with an opponent such as North Korea, which accepts only one principle, namely that might is right?

Mr. Speaker: I inform the House that I have selected the amendments in the name of the Prime Minister in both today's debates.

Andrew Lansley: I beg to move,
	That this House notes the Government's failure to improve public health outcomes and to reduce health inequalities; believes that the gap between the public health of the UK and that of comparable health economies is unacceptable; identifies obesity, smoking, sexually transmitted disease, infectious disease control, teenage pregnancy, alcohol and substance abuse, the promotion of healthy lifestyles and screening for treatable disease as areas of particular concern; supports frontline staff striving in adverse circumstances to improve the health of the nation; is concerned about the shortage of public health staff due to the Government's financial mismanagement; joins with the Chief Medical Officer in condemning the use of public health funds to tackle NHS deficits; and calls on the Government to ensure that funds for public health are spent on addressing remediable health issues.
	The Secretary of State has called me to explain that she would be unable to be here, and I quite understand why that is so. We hope that we shall see her later in the debate. I understand that the Under-Secretary of State for Health, the hon. Member for Bury, South (Mr. Lewis) will reply to the debate, and that the Minister of State, Department of Health, the hon. Member for Don Valley (Caroline Flint) will lead for the Government—

Andrew Lansley: If the hon. Gentleman does not mind, I shall answer the hon. Member for Dumfries and Galloway (Mr. Brown) first. We must bear in mind the reduction in mortality rates from cancer, which have been sustained over a period of time, but at broadly the same trend rate. In which period of time was the reduction in the prevalence of cigarette smoking among adults the greatest? The answer is: from 1980 to 1990, when it reduced from 39 to 29 per cent. In the eight years since this Government came into office, it has reduced from 28 to 25 per cent. The previous Government set a target to bring the prevalence of smoking down to 20 per cent. by 2000. That was not reached, and it has not been reached since. If the hon. Member for Dumfries and Galloway is saying that smoking has historically been the most preventable cause of death, he is right. Action on it is necessary.

Andrew Lansley: In a moment.
	Representing the constituency that I do, I am sure the Minister will be aware of the south Cambridgeshire physical activity strategy and the exercise referral schemes in the area, which is part of an evaluation conducted with the Medical Research Council's epidemiology unit. The proposal for that evaluation said:
	"A recent review of evidence on exercise referral schemes that included the findings of a Cochrane review reached the following conclusions".
	I shall quote just the first one:
	"Exercise referral schemes showed positive moderate sized effect on increasing self-reported physical activity in the short term but evidence of sustained effect beyond 12 months was lacking."
	That is why the evaluation is taking place.
	I looked at the so-called evaluation that the Government published with their pilot this morning. It says:
	"Overall the data supports the view that exercise referral is an effective intervention for initially engaging and facilitating physical activity change in adults and older adults".
	This is typical of the Government's gimmicks. We know that physical activity among older adults in particular gives benefits. What we want to know is what schemes are likely to deliver sustained benefits that justify the investment. Those benefits may well justify such investment, but the Government parade, as they always do, the fact that they have done something. They say that there is an evaluation. We know that it has not been sustained beyond 12 months. The Government do not talk about an evaluation that will assess whether exercise referrals work and in what circumstances, because lo and behold, they are happening in south Cambridgeshire.

Andy Reed: I thank the hon. Gentleman for finally giving way. As he knows, I have a passion for sport and physical activity. Representing Loughborough as I do, I not only must engage in such activity, but take great pleasure in doing so. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that the last Government's record—up to 1997—was pretty atrocious, especially in relation to school sports? I admit that this Government took some time to recognise school sports' full value, but will the hon. Gentleman acknowledge that the investment now being made—two hours of sport per week within the curriculum, possibly four hours by 2010—will make an enormous difference to the future? Will he apologise for the last Government's record and confirm that enormous strides are now being made, while even greater advances are being achieved in adult sport?

Andrew Lansley: I will pass my hon. Friend a copy of "Fitness 4 Health", a leaflet which advertises the south Cambridgeshire exercise referral scheme, supported by both the primary care trust and the local authority. In 2004-05, the 176 local health professionals registered with the scheme made 430 referrals. It was particularly important to those with type 2 diabetes.
	I entirely agree with my hon. Friend about the importance of such schemes: I do not underestimate it. I am merely saying that the Government should not get away with claiming that they somehow invented exercise referrals, or that they have evaluated them. The same things are happening elsewhere.
	We have not yet talked about obesity in children, but that situation is also deteriorating seriously. There has been a 50 per cent. increase in the proportion of boys with a body mass index over 30, and a 40 per cent. increase among girls. Our children are getting fatter faster than children anywhere else in Europe. That returns us to the point made by the hon. Member for Loughborough (Mr. Reed): we need more sport in schools, and also outside them. Conservative Members are committed to ensuring that sport receives lottery funding, but it must be increasingly well used.

Andrew Lansley: No, I do not. I think schools have a responsibility for the food that is provided at school—but, frankly, parents have an even greater responsibility.
	There is a great deal that we can do. There is not a lot of disagreement on this subject in the House. We want to make sure that there are fresh foods that are freshly prepared in schools—and if that is not possible as many schools do not have kitchens, technologies and opportunities are increasingly available for fresh food to be prepared elsewhere without it having to be cooked on site, and we should use them.
	Let us look at the Government's record on sexual health. There is an epidemic of sexually transmitted infections. That was not the case up until the mid-1990s, particularly because of the tombstone campaign; the 20th anniversary of the launch of that campaign by Lord Fowler and the then Government is a couple of weeks away. That showed what is possible when a national campaign is conducted that is designed not only to focus on those who are at risk but also to change the surrounding culture. Not only did we have the best record in Europe on prevention of HIV infection, but we had a substantial reduction in other sexually transmitted infections.
	What have we had since? Chlamydia is up 147 per cent; syphilis is up 1,653 per cent; and HIV infection is up 111 per cent. The Government have recently promised £50 million for sexual health campaigns but they are actually spending only £3.6 million on them. In the early 1990s, the then Government were spending £15 million a year in real terms on the sexual health campaign. That figure has now fallen below £5 million.

Sarah McCarthy-Fry: On funding, surely the hon. Gentleman accepts that if his party had had its way, primary care trusts would not have had the additional funding that they received, because his party voted against it.

Andrew Lansley: I agree with my hon. Friend, who makes a good point, but if he will forgive me, I shall move on as I want to speak for only about 10 minutes more.
	When we consider infectious diseases, we find that HIV has more than doubled and that there has been a 20 per cent. increase in tuberculosis reports in England in two years. In 2001, Ministers promised a strategy on hepatitis C by the end of the year. It was not published until July 2004. According to the Government's estimates, a minimum of 200,000 people are infected with hepatitis C but are undiagnosed. Failure to treat them could lead to 100,000 patients with end-stage liver disease some years hence.

Andrew Lansley: No, I shall not give way again.
	What has the Department of Health been doing about infectious diseases over the last year? Statistics issued by the Department last week showed that between 2004-05 and 2005-06 its net expenditure on infectious diseases went down from £1.5 billion to£1.2 billion, which includes the 20 per cent. reduction in the budget of the Health Protection Agency. Given the agency's current work, one wonders how sensible that reduction was.
	The public health budget is not just for primary prevention, but also for secondary prevention. The Government's amendment refers to bowel cancer screening. By the end of December, 500,000 people should have been screened through the new bowel cancer screening programme; the number will actually be only 100,000.
	Two years ago, the Government's White Paper described how pharmacies would be used to roll out new ways for people to access screening services. Only 1.5 per cent. of pharmacies across the country have been commissioned to provide local enhanced screening services. Only 26 per cent. of pharmacies have been commissioned to provide stop-smoking services. During the local elections I visited a pharmacy in Havering—in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Romford (Andrew Rosindell)—and the pharmacist told me that they were in the middle of providing smoking cessation services but had been told to stop because the primary care trust had withdrawn the budget. It is all to do with finances.
	We have talked about the smoking ban. Rightly, we concluded that we might save 1,000 lives that way. The bowel cancer screening process might save more than 1,000 lives. Breast cancer screening saves perhaps 1,000 or 1,500 lives a year. What about abdominal aortic aneurysms? Where is the Government's action on that? Some 2,400 people with ruptured aneurysms go into accident and emergency departments every year; 50 per cent. of them die. What about men who are over 65? A Gloucestershire pilot—I do not know whether the hon. Member for Gloucester (Mr. Dhanda) is present—looked at a screening programme. It is straightforward and involves an ultrasound that is like the ultrasound that pregnant women have during the course of antenatal care. Research on that was published in 2002.
	The National Screening Committee said, yes, we should have such a programme. The Minister's predecessor said that there was going to be an action plan by the end of 2004. It is now the end of 2006. More than 1,000 lives are lost a year from ruptured aortic aneurysms, but there is no screening programme. The Government, through the White Paper, buy 1,200 health trainers, for which there is no evidence base. We have an evidence base for saving lives through a screening programme, but the Government are doing nothing.

Caroline Flint: I beg to move, To leave out from "House" to the end of the Question, and to add instead thereof:
	"welcomes the Government's trebling of investment in the NHS by 2008 which is crucial to improving public health and tackling health inequalities; notes that this extra investment has enabled a huge expansion in preventive services including extending breast cancer screening to women aged 65-70 which has helped increase the number of breast cancers detected by 40 per cent. since 2001 and the first ever national bowel cancer screening programme which will detect around 3,000 bowel cancers a year when fully rolled out; acknowledges that this Government has done more than any previous government to help people give up smoking, including banning smoking in all workplaces and public places from 1st July 2007; further welcomes the help and support being given to people to live healthier lives including two million 4 to6 year olds now receiving a free piece of fruit or portion of vegetable, new healthier standards for school meals, clearer food labelling, new health trainers and NHS life checks; and recognises the unprecedented action this Government has taken to tackle the root causes of ill health and health inequalities including helping more people find work, lifting a significant number of children out of relative poverty and taking action to tackle poor housing."
	I ask the House to pity Opposition Members, who have to attempt coherent speeches after the confusion, hypocrisy and brass-necked cheek that we have just been subjected to. The hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr. Lansley) springs forth with the zeal of a convert to public health, but his conversion to public health is rather like that of an Ebenezer Scrooge who has been awoken in 2006 to the need to changeby the nightmare of a Tory Christmas past. The nightmare reminded him of all that his party could have done with nearly two decades in power, and all that it did to undermine the public health of this country.

Andrew Gwynne: My hon. Friend spoke about Tory Christmas past and Tory Christmas present, but for my constituents there were no Tory Christmas presents. Through the winter fuel allowance and the warm front grants, we have come a long way from the days when Tory Ministers told pensioners in my constituency to knit woolly hats.

Caroline Flint: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The warm front scheme has helped thousands of families on low and fixed incomes to install central heating or upgrade old and inefficient heating systems; the winter fuel allowance has been a boost to pensioner households; and Sure Start has been vital to starting children off on the road to better health. All those initiatives have had an impact on health, and all have been rejected by the Conservatives, time and again.

Caroline Flint: That is the first decline in nine years, but I am not complacent. There are concerns about children and young women. However, the proportion of 16 to 24-year-old women who had drunk more than six units on at least one day in the previous week has fallen to 22 per cent. from 28 per cent. in 1998. We must be cautious about these statistics, but there seems to be a growing awareness of the impact of alcohol. I hope the hon. Gentleman will agree that our campaign to point out to young people that, although alcohol makes them feel invincible, they are actually very vulnerable under its influence, will strike home. The feedback from that campaign has been extremely positive.

Caroline Flint: Indeed, and I am pleased that in Doncaster we are following the same route. For the past couple of years we have encouraged closer co-operation with local government. That is starting to pay dividends. One aspect of that is the joint appointment of public health directors at a local level, which can only add to what we can achieve beyond health and in the wider community.
	I am sure hon. Members in all parts of the House will agree that today's challenges are very different from those of 100 years ago. In the 19th century and early 20th century, most premature deaths were due to infectious illnesses, often striking people down in infancy or in the prime of life. In 1854, 600 people died from cholera caught from the infected water of the Broad street pump in London. But times change and the challenges are different today. We are living longer, so the diseases of middle life and old age are more pertinent now than they were 100 years ago.
	Thanks to the investment by this Government, we have made changes that are improving public health. Life expectancy has continued to increase both for males and for females in England as a whole, and for those living in communities with the worst health and deprivation. Sixty per cent of those communities—the spearhead areas—are on track to narrow the life expectancy gap between their areas and England as a whole by 10 per cent. by 2010. The gap that meant that someone was more likely to die of heart disease or cancer if they were poor is narrowing.
	The NHS and local authorities are key players in tackling health inequalities. For the first time ever, the issue of health inequalities is one of the Department's top six priorities for the NHS, and from next April it will be a mandatory target for local authorities through local area agreements. The figures for children dying before their first birthday are the lowest ever, and the latest figures suggest that the infant mortality gap between our poorest families and the rest of the population has stopped widening. We cannot be complacent, as I said, but there are indications that the efforts of many people on the front line are starting to have an impact.
	None of this is accidental. One lesson that we have learned is that to prevent these problems recurring from generation to generation we have to intervene early in life. "Healthy Start" and the healthy schools programme are two examples of this. "Healthy Start", which was launched nationally last Monday, is the first major reform of the world war two welfare food scheme to meet modern dietary requirements. The healthy schools programme lays down the building blocks for our young people. Last year, we decided that we needed to highlight and prioritise healthy eating and physical activity in order for a school to become a healthy school. It is a voluntary programme, but more than 80 per cent. of schools have chosen to participate and are reporting real benefits, including the provision of at least two hours of sport and physical activity. That figure was less than 30 per cent. in 1997-98, when we came into government, so we are making progress.

Caroline Flint: As the hon. Gentleman will know, this year, there was a manufacturing problem with the vaccine that no one could have foreseen, and we had to deal with that. On vaccine delivery, I remind him that we negotiate the total amount of vaccine, based on what we identify to be the need of the population—and, I must say, we have allowed the vaccine to be provided on the NHS to an ever widening group of people. It is up to general practitioners and primary care trusts to make their orders for vaccines.
	Of course, we want to improve the system, but the picture varies across the country. In many places, the authorities are on top of the issue, and district nurses provide the vaccine in people's homes. In those areas, the rates of vaccination are increasing. However, it seems that other areas are not on top of the problem, and we have to understand that. We should support GPs, and we are working on doing that. That is why my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has asked for a review of the issue, to see how we can improve. However, that should not take away from the positive progress that we have made. We are considered to be one of the world leaders in flu vaccination, and other countries rightly look to us, and our developments in that area.
	Our extended breast cancer screening programme, which now includes 65 to 70-year-olds, has screened over 600,000 more women, and it saves 1,400 livesa year. As my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Rob Marris) said, the bowel cancer screening programme, which is a world first, will detect some 3,000 cases each year within3 years.

Kevin Barron: I am sorry that I had to be absent for some of the speech of the hon. Member for Romsey (Sandra Gidley), and also some of the speech of my hon. Friend the Minister. I was asked several weeks ago, as Chairman of the Health Committee, to speak at a reception on the Terrace given by the all-party thrombosis group.
	My hon. Friend said that the official Opposition had a brass neck to table this motion, and I have to agree with her. The motion claims that
	"the gap between the public health of the UK and that of comparable health economies"
	is too wide. Anyone who studied the last 20 or 30 years of public health investment would probably begin to understand why that is so. When in government, the Opposition paid scant regard to the issues that created our present health inequalities and bad health care indexes. They rejected—presumably for ideological reasons—the notion of a direct link between social class and health, placing responsibility entirely on the individual with no reference to housing, environment, occupation or income. I have been in the House for some years—for two decades, in fact—and remember many debates on public health.

Andrew Murrison: I am surprised that the right hon. Gentleman, who is Chairman of the Health Committee, does not know about this but for his information it was published in 1998, and it was one of the first reports that the Labour party commissioned on coming into office.

Kevin Barron: The level of Opposition Front-Bench Members' response to the incidents in Rotherham following the introduction of healthier school meals in September shows that they have a long way to go before they will believe even half of the motion they tabled today.
	Last Friday, I visited the Whiston and Worrygoose junior and infant school in my constituency, because it had just received its second basic skills award for literacy and numeracy. I always make an effort to go to primary schools when such awards are made, because in constituencies such as mine decades of under-attainment in literacy and numeracy have led to many problems, including ill-health, as has been well recorded by public health professionals.
	The school meals are cooked on site, and I held an impromptu discussion with some year 6 children about the new menu, which I had already had a look at during my visit. The level of their debate was far higher than the hon. Gentleman's comments about what happened at Rawmarsh school. As I said earlier, Opposition Front-Bench Members have a long way to go before they start tabling motions about public health, especially about obesity.
	In general, public health issues are far more challenging than for the past 150 years. In the past, it was simpler to deal with things that had an impact on public health, such as sanitation, the lack of fresh water, bad housing and dirty air, before the clean air legislation of the 1950s. All those things had a bad effect on public health but they were reasonably easy to tackle—be it by central Government or, in most cases, by local government. Of course, that is not to say that there is no bad housing or that housing could not be better, but its public health effects are not as great as they were in years gone by.
	The issues that will lead to public health problems in the 21st century are affected by the individual decisions we take each day, in terms of our lifestyles and of what we eat and drink. The Government have to tackle those things. In part, that can be done by education. Educational campaigns are a cheap and effective way of raising awareness of health problems, but evidence suggests that awareness does not always translate into changed behaviour. Adolescents do not necessarily smoke or drink less as a result of health education programmes. I have campaigned against smoking for many years and I have always felt that we will never completely stop young children trying cigarettes. There will be some success but it will never be total while cigarettes exist. The important thing is to continue those education programmes.
	Another area where there can be success, and has been success in the past, is taxation. One thing to the credit of the Opposition is that, when they were in office, the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, the right hon. and learned Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke), put a health tax—an above-inflation tax—on cigarettes. The figures show that that reduced consumption. When the Conservatives went into opposition, he got a job as vice-president of British American Tobacco. I do not know whether that was cause and effect, but the people there were not very happy with him at the time. Taxes on alcohol also reduce consumption. That does not mean to say that people will stop drinking or smoking, but there is an effect.
	One thing that we could do, and that has been effective in the past, is to bring in restrictive measures, such as the banning of tobacco advertising. Some of the big public safety areas—outside this area—include things such as seat belts in cars. I remember them being put in when I was first driving, when it was not compulsory to wear them. It was only when legislation was passed that take-up levels of people wearing seat belts became as high as they are today. The same could be said in relation to drinking and driving. When measurement was brought in and we said, "This is an offence. You will lose your licence," things quickly got a lot better.
	I want to finish with two points about where we should go in the future. As I said, I do not think that all these things are a matter for the state. I certainly do not think that they are necessarily a matter for the national health service. There is a lot evidence that other organisations—I think that the Government call them non-governmental organisations or the third sector—can have great influence in relation to what is happening in our health care system, or, perhaps I should say, individual needs.
	A note was passed around earlier about weight loss programmes in South Cambridgeshire. I have with me the outcome of research that was done on a slimming referral service in Derbyshire. The report is from the journal of the Royal Institute of Public Health. It was a collaboration between the Southern Derbyshire health authority as it was then, and Slimming World, which is a high street company that helps people to lose weight. I know that Weight Watchers does that too, so I am not advertising one against the other. The referrals are beginning to work. There is no question about that, looking at the report that I have here. It provides evidence that, sometimes, these types of referral schemes are better than going to see a dietician locally and being told to go away and lose weight, and getting advice such as, "Don't eat this. Don't eat that." Instead, people sit in the village hall with somebody who has been through the process, who usually leads the class, and can tell people about how easy it has been.
	One of the things that struck me about this scheme is that, of the 107 patients who were originally referred, 97 enrolled, 62 completed the free 12-week course and 47 went on to self-fund the next 12-week course and did it themselves, and stayed with that weight-referral programme. There are experts out there—not necessarily working for the national health service, but working close by—who can help in many ways with individuals who have weight-loss issues, which, if not tackled, will certainly lead to disease and, potentially, an early death in years to come.
	GlaxoSmithKline nutritional health care had a study done about how to get families involves in physical exercise, as well. We had a debate about rugby or football at school. Well, all that stops at 16 anyway, but what about the vast majority of kids, who are not much good at rugby or football at school? We always think that exercise is about people who are involved in one sport or another, but exercise could be going to school or work on a bicycle. It could be many things. We need to learn where there is evidence—not just in the national health service; in wider organisations—and make sure that that evidence base is the real area where we start decision making. The national health service should have been taking evidence-based decisions for the past 60 years, but, sadly, its track record on that has not been good. It is about time that we got better, especially in areas in which individual lifestyles will have an impact on public health in the years to come.

Howard Stoate: I am delighted to take part in the debate as I am co-chair of the all-party group on primary care and public health, and as the House knows, I still do some work as a practising general practitioner.
	I am particularly pleased that the Government have set 1 July as the date for the implementation of smoke-free legislation in England. I hope the Minister will follow that up with the announcement of a major public education campaign to ensure that the public and licensees are fully aware of the implications of the new legislation.
	Next year's date will also provide a major incentive for smokers to quit. As well we know, of the 12 million smokers in this country, at least 8 million at any one time would love to give up smoking. I hope they now have a date to work to, so that they can plan their strategy. I am pleased that in general practice we can prescribe nicotine replacement therapy and that most practices, if not all, have nurses who are well trained in helping people to stop smoking. Coupled with the prescriptions that we are able to give on the NHS thanks to the Government, that is making an impact on the number of smokers whom we see. That will reduce the burden of ill health in the future to a welcome degree.
	In line with the polluter pays principle, I would like to see a profits tax on tobacco companies thatwould fund educational programmes on the health risks of passive smoking and the monitoring and implementation of smoke-free public places. I know that that is controversial, but it would show that the Government meant business by making sure that the companies that profit from smoking put something back into the community to educate people on the ill health which that causes.
	I also support proposals to raise the minimum legal age for the purchase and sale of tobacco from 16 to 18. Far more needs to be done to discourage children from smoking, and increasing the limit to 18 would be a step in the right direction. Raising the legal age would also send a strong clear message to young people about the dangers of tobacco, and in conjunction with other anti-smoking strategies would, I hope, help teenagers resist taking up a habit that many of them will live to regret in their shortened lives.
	It has been stated that alcohol is implicated in about 40,000 deaths per year in this country and is directly responsible for 5,000 deaths a year. That is a jumbo jet full every month. The World Health Organisation recently identified alcohol as the third highest risk to health in developed countries. Almost 40 per cent. of men and 25 per cent. of women exceed daily benchmarks of three to four units for men and two to three units for women on at least one occasion a week. Twenty per cent. of men and 10 per cent. of women drink more than double the daily limit in one session at least once a week.
	The rate of binge drinking is even more alarming among young adults: 37 per cent. of 16 to 24-year-old men and 27 per cent. of 16 to 24-year-old women binge drink regularly. Between 1988 and 2000 the number of women consuming over 14 units a week rose by 70 per cent. Approximately one in four 16 and 17-year-olds are hazardous drinkers—that is, they have experienced immediate problems, such as loss of memory, injuries or failure to do what is expected of them, after a night's drinking. Among 16 to 24-year-olds, this figure rises to 42 per cent.
	Even more alarmingly, 11 to 15-year-olds who drink alcohol now consume nearly twice as much as they did in 1990. They consume on average 9.8 units a week, compared with 5.3 units a week in 1990. Since the early 1970s there has been an eightfold increase in deaths from chronic liver disease among men aged 35 to 44, and a sevenfold increase among women of the same age group.
	It has been estimated that alcohol costs the NHS up to £3 billion a year in hospital services alone. Every Friday and Saturday night, 70 per cent. of all accident and emergency admissions and 80 per cent. of pedestrian road deaths are alcohol related. One in four acute male admissions is alcohol related. The cost of alcohol abuse to the wider economy is estimated at£20 billion a year.
	There are two key factors in the increase in heavy drinking, particularly among young adults—price and availability. Alcohol is getting cheaper. In the past40 years, consumption per person has doubled and the price of alcohol relative to income has halved. The number of shops selling alcohol has risen sharply, and a third of all 24-hour licences granted were given to supermarkets, where alcohol is cheapest.
	I do not want to be a killjoy at Christmas, but the fact is that alcohol will wreck many lives over the festive period, and we need to take firm action. I propose that the Government should move towards legislation on banning the advertising of alcohol as they have for cigarettes. We need to emphasise the impact of alcohol abuse in young people on the development of drug habits and to improve recognition of the need for counselling and treatment services, particularly for young people. There is also an urgent need for more school-based education founded on an understanding of young people's perceptions of drinking.
	There are about 1 million obese children under the age of 16 in the UK—three times as many as 20 years ago. Those soaring obesity rates have led to an increase in childhood type 2 diabetes, which will lead in future to more heart disease, osteoarthritis and certain cancers. Estimates indicate that if current trends continue, at least one fifth of boys and one third of girls will be obese by 2020. I am pleased that Ofcom has finally put forward proposals to restrict the number of advertisements for foods high in fat, salt and sugar, but they do not go far enough.

Howard Stoate: The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. Obviously, the food manufacturers would say that it is all about activity, while other specialists, particularly those from the National Obesity Forum, say that it is a much more complex interaction between calories in and calories out. Nothing like enough is known about the relative merits of calories and activity. There is clearly a relationship between the two, but it is necessary to do far more work to find out exactly where the problem lies so that we can come up with more effective strategies.
	One of the most worrying aspects is that many parents do not have enough information to make healthy choices for their children. A MORI poll carried out some years ago found that 70 per cent. of parents said that they did not have the information that they needed to ensure that their children ate a well-balanced and healthy diet and that much more needed to be done. We need a much more sustained and consistent public health campaign to improve parents' and children's understanding of the impact and benefits of healthy living. Families need to be educated and empowered through guidance that recognises the impact of those factors on children's development of lifelong habits to do with eating and activity.
	There is a strong case to be made for the establishment of a national obesity institute to improve collaboration between stakeholder groups. In addition, extra funding should be available to establish and sustain training programmes for those involved in the care of children with obesity. That should be complemented with resources to allow children to gain access to specialist regional obesity services. We simply need more specialist nurses and GPs. Every single primary and secondary school should have a school nurse to advise children on healthy living and other lifestyle issues. At present, there is only one school nurse for every 10 or 11 schools in the country, and we should improve on that significantly.
	There should be increased access to subsidised sporting facilities for children and their parents. Ready access to such facilities is particularly important for those from lower socio-economic groups. "Exercise on prescription", provided at reduced cost, or free of charge, should be expanded. I was pleased to hear the Minister's recent announcement about prescribing more exercise classes; that is a welcome step in the right direction.
	We have heard a fair amount about sexually transmitted infections this afternoon. The latest report from the Health Protection Agency presents data for 2005. Through the presentation and description of epidemiological data, the report highlights the fact that, despite the increasing complexity of the situation, our HIV and sexually transmitted infection surveillance systems have evolved to become among the most comprehensive and informative in the world, and that is very welcome. It is essential to campaign for education strategies that increase young people's knowledge of the full spectrum of sexually transmitted infections.
	Well-designed sex education programmes have been shown to be effective. The Men's Health Forum recently carried out a project, aimed to reach men with messages about chlamydia and sexual health, and it was a good example of an effective education programme. The project was backed by the Department of Health and Roche Diagnostics, and it worked with male students and soldiers to increase understanding of young men's attitudes to sexual health. It was followed by a programme in which testing kits for chlamydia were made available for collection from men's toilets, including some in university colleges. Positive health behaviours must be promoted among individuals who are infected, so that they come forward to seek treatment and go on to practice safer sex. We must ensure that we go ahead with improving access to GUM—genito-urinary medicine—clinics. I am pleased that my hon. Friend the Minister announced an aim of reaching the 48-hour target by 2008; that is very welcome.
	We have already heard about the importance of maintaining a specialist public health work force. The recent reconfiguration of strategic health authorities and primary care trusts has so far led to a reduction in the number of directors of public health from 303 to 152. I hope that all the people displaced by the reorganisation will be re-employed as public health consultants, because we must make sure that we do nothing to undermine or reduce the important work done by directors of public health and their departments.
	I hope that, in partnership with local authorities and voluntary organisations, directors of public health and public health consultants will continue to ensure that the local population's needs are assessed and addressed through public health programmes. They currently provide leadership in three domains of public health: health protection, health improvement and tackling health inequalities. I am concerned to make sure that the reconfiguration of PCTs and strategic health authorities in no way reduces or dilutes the work that is currently carried out.
	For us Labour Members, the story has been one of good news: the reduction in mortality rates for heart disease, strokes and cancer are impressive, and, as we heard, there has been a significant extension of the childhood immunisation programme, which has certainly prevented many hundreds, if not thousands, of preventable deaths among young children. We have every right to be very proud of our record, but the old adage is true—a lot has been done, but there remains much to do. I am keen to work with my colleagues on the Front Bench to make sure that the improvements made in recent years on public health are maintained.

Nadine Dorries: I shall focus on sexual health, but first I should like to pick the Minister up on a comment that she made about flu vaccines. She said that she "allowed" an increase in flu vaccine provision this year, but may I remind her that the only allowing that takes place is on the part of the British public, who allow us to come to the House to serve them? Her comment may be indicative of the extent to which the Government are out of touch with the British people; we do not "allow" the British public anything.
	An entire generation has been let down and blighted by the Government's failure to protect our teenagers in respect of sexual health. The Government knew that there was a problem with sexual health, and that is why the Secretary of State announced that £50 million was to be spent on a sexual health campaign, but only£4 million was spent. We can see a pattern emerge: when any investment is made, or when the Government want to take credit for any inward investment, they do so, but the minute that there is a problem, they blame the hospital managers. However, hospital managers cannot be blamed for the statistics. In 2004-05, cases of syphilis were up 23 per cent., chlamydia was up 5 per cent., genital warts was up 1 per cent., and genital herpes was up 4 per cent. Newly diagnosed cases of HIV doubled in 10 years and, among women, there was a sixfold increase in 10 years, with 3,036 cases now being diagnosed a year. That cannot be blamed on hospital managers.
	Despite those figures, hospitals are deciding to cut their genito-urinary medicine departments completely. A local newspaper ran a story about my local hospital, Bedford hospital, saying:
	"The next round of cuts at Bedford Hospital will be unveiled today, with sexual health the main casualty...The document proposes that Genito Urinary Medicine..is moved out of the hospital, to be dealt with by GPs".
	I had a quick ring-around of my local GPs, who said that they have no specialist training in genito-urinary medicine, and have absolutely no idea how they are supposed to cope with genito-urinary medical problems in their surgeries, given the increase in sexual health problems.
	Some people criticised the AIDS campaign of the 1980s, which was mentioned earlier, because of the tombstones and the eerie images, but at least it gotthe message home. It meant that the general public knew how important safe sex was and what the consequences of not having safe sex could be. It is hardly surprising that new cases of HIV have risen dramatically. According to the Department of Health's own statistics, two thirds of men and women newly diagnosed with HIV said that they received no written or televised information, and that no information that they received had affected their sexual health. The same set of statistics, revealed by the Government, show that most people learn about HIV and AIDS through television soaps, so people learn more about AIDS from EastEnders than from the Government.
	Recently, the Minister decided that there should be a supermarket-wide poster campaign teaching children how to eat bananas.

Caroline Flint: No, I didn't.

Nadine Dorries: In fact, it is not available in many areas. It should be available in all areas, so that other groups can gain access to it. It is another case of the post code lottery. In certain parts of the country, women have to pay £26 for the morning-after pill atthe pharmacy, which is open all hours, including Saturdays—anyone can walk into one—but that is not the case in other parts of the country. It is free in only a small number of areas, but to reduce the number of abortions in the UK—there are 600 a day—we should make it free at all pharmacists. After all, it is provided free by GPs.

Natascha Engel: I am not even bothering to answer that.
	I would like to pick up one of the points that the hon. Member for Mid-Bedfordshire made earlier about sexual health services being taken out of acute units into general practice surgeries. That is a key element of what we are trying to do—to localise, to make more familiar and to make it easier for young men and women to access those services. I do not know how many gynaecological units the hon. Lady has visitedin her own constituency or elsewhere, but those environments are not as friendly as general practices.

Anne Main: May I say that our genito-urinary medicine unit consultant, Dr. Pat Munday, resigned because she was short-staffed after posts were frozen. She operates a drop-in unit. She says that people do not always want to go to their GP, as they want the facility of sexual health units, so it is no good just saying that everything can be moved back into GP surgeries.

Jeremy Hunt: First, it is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Dartford (Dr. Stoate) in this debate, as both he and I have put some of the issues that we have talked about into practice. We both entered a competition for MPs' fitness with  Men's Fitness magazine. I pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman for winning the competition, but I warn him that I came top on the running machine, so I hope he has the stamina to listen to what I have to say.
	It is also a pleasure to follow the hon. Memberfor North-East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel) and I want to answer her central question. She asked whythe Opposition have brought about today's debate. The reason is very simple: a central plank in the Government's public health policy—addressing health inequalities—has been a failure.
	There has been much discussion this afternoon about the distant past, but in the near past—the last nine years—life expectancy has still been seven to eight years lower in the poorest parts of the country and the inequality has widened by two years for men and five years for women. The crucial reason is not a lack of good intentions, but a lack of understanding that investment in public health—not in clinical services, however critical—is most important for successfully addressing health inequalities.
	The chief medical officer's annual report on public health spelled that out very clearly. He said that investment in public health was falling as a proportion of expenditure in the NHS, that the number of public health professionals was static and that public health budgets had been raided and used to fund deficits. We heard a raft of statistics showing why the Government's policy is failing. Alcohol-related deaths are up; tuberculosis infections are up; syphilis up; chlamydia up; obesity rising; smoking declining, but inequalities persist among smokers.
	The failure to understand the difference between morbidity and mortality is critical because, in the end, the incidence of poor public health has to be matched with investment in public health and the incidence of disease has to be matched with investment in clinical services. The result of that misunderstanding is a grossly unfair funding formula.
	I would like to tell the House about my own area of Guildford and Waverley. The hospital and community health services budget for 2007-08 is increased by 2 per cent. because there are many older people, but it is reduced by 25 per cent. because of a lack of deprivation. What is the impact? Last year, my constituents had to wait twice as long as people in Manchester for ear, nose and throat elective surgery. They had to wait nearly twice as long for breast surgery compared with people in the Health Secretary's Leicester constituency; and three times as long for trauma and orthopaedic work as people living in the Prime Minister's Sedgefield constituency.
	Now, this year, as a result of problems in the funding formula, my constituents face the closure of Milford hospital, a community rehabilitation hospital, and of the Royal Surrey County hospital—one of the top accident and emergency hospitals in the country, which happens to have the joint lowest mortality rate, as well as being a foremost cancer specialist centre.
	I want to brief, so I shall make just one final point. Another vital factor for public health is stability in budgets, but in my area of Guildford and Waverley, there was a budget increase of £9 million last year, while this year it has been told to reduce spending by £16 million. There is a phrase for that—boom and bust. If we are to change people's attitudes—we have talked about the importance of doing that this afternoon—it requires sustained investment over a period of time, not boom and bust.
	Today, the Prime Minister is reported to be telling the NHS Confederation that service improvements in NHS hospitals are being implemented to ensure that the very sick have speedy access to specialist care, but also to treat people more conveniently closer to home.

John Mann: I have a few questions for the Minister. The healthy living project in my constituency has the ambitious vision of becoming a centre for sport and learning with a GP practice, community nurses and youth workers built into it. Will the Minister take a particular look into that idea, not least because the aim is to build health facilities on a school campus in order to create a new concept of an extended school?
	Secondly, will the Minister look into the "Do it4 Real" project run by the Youth Hostel Association, which the Minister with responsibility for youth is currently considering re-funding? It is important to see how children from disadvantaged communities are being engaged in a summer school for all kinds of backgrounds and communities—with healthy and active living as a theme. Will he reflect on the uniqueness of that external organisation and how it has helped to provide opportunities for the development of basic cooking skills for today's microwave generation? Could that particular programme be taken to another level—perhaps with slightly older children—and develop some key skills that children will require for healthy living as they get older?
	Thirdly, will the Minister look into the possibility of conducting a longitudinal study, comparing three-to-18 schools with schools to which children change at age 11, to assess whether the engagement of young people is any different in the different types of school, particularly in respect of their involvement in healthy lifestyles? That involves both the food that children eat at school and their active participation.
	My fourth question is aimed more at the Opposition and I am sure that Conservative Front Benchers will want to illuminate an issue that has remained unclear for some time. Will the hon. Member for Westbury(Dr. Murrison) clarify his party's precise drugs policy on heroin injecting rooms, which have been supported on a number of occasions by his party leader? How precisely will they fit into a public health agenda, should the Conservative party ever be returned to power?
	Conservative party policy at the previous election was to provide rehabilitation places for 18,000 under-18s. However, it has not yet explained its policy on the 200,000 adults who have an addictive drug problem. Where will they be treated?
	The motion refers to "comparable health economies". On drugs policy, it would be helpful to know which country, in the opinion of Opposition Members, mirrors Conservative party policies on drugs most closely.

Ivan Lewis: The Conservative party has no shame whatever. It abolished the word "poverty" from public policy, while allowing it to become a reality for one in three children. Too often, it has cried "Nanny state" when it should have offered responsible leadership. The Conservative Government left behind a battered and scarred society, in which public squalor and human misery were the reality for too many families and communities.
	Increasingly, however, the Conservative party is caught out facing two ways. In response to the announcement by my hon. Friend the Minister with responsibility for public health of an expansion of activities programmes for inactive people, the hon. Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning) said in yesterday's newspaper that there is a financial crisis in the NHS, jobs are being lost and wards are lying empty, while money is being wasted on this gimmick. "It is a disgrace," he said. However, the shadow Health Minister, the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) said that we have to consider imaginative solutions to get people active. He said that programmes such as "Strictly Come Dancing" have seized people's imagination, and that such a good way of keeping fit could keep people healthy and out of hospital.
	In  The House Magazine, the organisation Forest recently had an advert saying, "No thanks" to the nanny state, which, it says, tells people not to eat, drink, smoke or think. It attacks politicians for having a dialogue with people about responsible approaches to their health. Big government, it says, is watching. It says, "Eat, drink and smoke." At the Conservative party conference in Bournemouth, however, almost 400 people tried to get into Forest's fringe meeting, and hospital staff were forced to turn people away, citing health and safety reasons.
	The hon. Member for Westbury (Dr. Murrison) seems extremely annoyed about the  Health Service Journal publication. He says that it is propaganda. I cannot work out whether it is the photograph of my hon. Friend the Minister with responsibility for public health that concerns him, or whether he is offended by the photograph of feet. The serious point is that using such publications to make the issue relevant and attractive to people is far more effective than boring guidance will ever be.
	In contrast to the Conservative party, the Labour party's very raison d'être is the belief that every individual, irrespective of race, religion or social class, has the right to fulfil their potential. My party has always believed that every child matters, that health care should be available free to all at the point of need, irrespective of ability to pay, and that successful individuals and strong communities march hand in hand in the good society. It is basic to those beliefs that without a healthy life people's aspirations and potential are blighted, and our society and economy suffer.
	We are committed to an enabling state, in which we lead, educate and legislate appropriately, responding to 21st century realities with 21st century solutions. In addition, there is personal and corporate responsibility, with individuals as citizens, parents and opinion formers taking responsibility for promoting healthy lifestyles, and with companies exercising responsibility in the legitimate pursuit of market share and profit margins. We have a proud record, although we always acknowledge that there is a lot more to do on that agenda. Let me now address some of the important contributions to the debate from hon. Members on both sides of the House.
	I always admire the honesty of the hon. Member for Romsey (Sandra Gidley). In a recent debate in the House, she said that she regretted the fact that her party had misled older people and their families at the last election by saying that there was a possibility that they would receive free personal care. We will remember that when we see her party's manifesto at the next general election. She made some serious points about antenatal support and breast feeding. We are proud of our healthy start programme, but it is only a beginning. The Department is working on a new plan for maternity services in this country, which will offer choice to every parent and family in every part of the country. The nature of antenatal support and earliest interventions, such as on breast feeding, are a crucial part of that.
	The hon. Lady launched a strange attack on the virtues of competitive sport. She said that she was worried about young people going back to playing football and hockey. In my experience, thousands of young people around the country play football and hockey and do so happily. I accept that her point about considering the motivation of every individual young person, and giving them the opportunity to be active, is an important one.

Chris Grayling: I hope that by the time we have the opportunity to take office the current Government will have started some of the rail investments that they promised five years ago. It is a bit of a cheek for a Member sitting on the Labour Benches to lecture and question us about rail investment when the current Government have made so many promises that they have failed to deliver.
	That is the big problem with the latest in a long line of grand strategy documents on transport. The Eddington report is the eighth major transport report that we have had from this Government since they came to power nine years ago. We have had multi-modal studies, a 10-year plan and White Papers on roads, rail and aviation. We have had Lord Birt's "blue skies" thinking, "The Future of Transport" and "Delivering Better Transport", and we now have the Eddington report on transport.
	The trouble is that Eddington just seems to tell us things we already knew, such as:
	"Even after accounting for environmental impacts, well-targeted infrastructure options are able to offer very high welfare and GDP returns per £1 of government expenditure with big gains for businesses, freight and commuters."
	It would not have taken my shadow Transport team18 months, a team of civil servants and a seven-figure sum in expenses and staff costs to work that out.

Chris Grayling: When the question of a Maglev line was raised, the hon. Gentleman came up with some rather bizarre figures. He claimed that it would cost £100 million per mile to build such a line, which is of course complete poppycock; he really should check his figures more carefully. Anybody who has travelled on the Maglev line in Shanghai could not come away with anything but the impression that we should look at such a project with great interest. We certainly should not automatically reject new ideas without looking at them carefully.
	The Eddington report does not just tell us things that we already know; some parts of it you simply could not make up, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Let us try this one, on page 179, to which Labour Members should listen:
	"Walking and cycling options have the potential for very high welfare returns relative to their cost but may not be enough alone to tackle the true scale of the further challenges facing the UK."
	Whoever wrote that deserves some form of prize and clearly has a bright future as a comedy writer. Of course, there is some good research in the report, but the truth is that after nine years of a Labour Government, Ministers really should be able to do better than producing yet another detailed strategy document, at a time when Britain needs action, not more research.
	I turn to the other major problem with the Eddington report. He is absolutely right to talk about the need for incremental projects, which are the best and quickest way to make a difference—I have been saying that for the past year—but his brief was to look at our transport needs post-2015. Are he and our Ministers seriously saying that we should wait 10 more years before getting the improvements that we so desperately need to ease congestion?
	What about the bigger, long-term vision that so many people in the transport world were expecting, such as a detailed analysis of the high-speed rail option. Of course, the one big idea that Eddington did put forward for Britain post-2015 was road pricing, but since that is already the current Government's policy, it is hardly a great breakthrough in thinking. I know that the Secretary of State has been desperately keen to hear the Conservative party's position on this issue and to get some political consensus, so let me finally give him what he has been waiting for, although I fear that I am going to disappoint him.
	I do think that an element of road pricing and the increased use of road charges will be a part of the strategy of any future Government, including a Conservative one, but the Secretary of State and I differ significantly over the scale and pace of any move toward road pricing. Some road-pricing schemes will emerge locally as a result of decision making within an individual town or city; the key is whether they have local consent. It is not the job of central Government to impose them, as this current Government are trying to do by threatening to withdraw funding for towns and cities that do not obey their instructions by introducing road pricing. That is happening to cities such as Birmingham and Manchester, which have been left in no doubt whatsoever that if they do not pursue road-pricing strategies, they will lose funding for other transport schemes.

Chris Grayling: I give my right hon. Friend a third option—that the money could be put into the general kitty. When the previous Secretary of State first announced the Government's intention to move toward a road-pricing scheme, he talked about one that was fiscally neutral. Since then, both he and the current Secretary of State appear to have backed away from that position. So it is clear that the Government are thinking about road pricing as a revenue-raising measure; what we do not know is whether that money will simply be invested in transport, or whether road pricing is actually a vehicle to generate additional funds for the Treasury.
	We also support the use of road charging to fund transport improvement schemes. The M6 toll road and the Queen Elizabeth bridge over the River Thames at Dartford both offer clear examples of how major projects can be funded, and we will see similar projects in future.
	Thirdly, I want road-user charging for lorries to be put firmly back on the agenda. Such a scheme is essential in order to level the playing field between British and overseas hauliers. Too many of our family-run haulage firms are facing bankruptcy because of a steady loss of business to their counterparts from other parts of Europe, who arrive with a cheap tank of diesel from Calais—often in a vehicle that is not road-worthy—and stay here for a week or two, taking local business. That has got to change. The Government gave a clear commitment to introduce such a scheme, and then went back on their word. This issue cannot be allowed to fester.

Chris Grayling: We have just heard yet another example from the Whips' brief. We believe in debating the issues. Labour Members appear to believe in following the diktat of the Whips Office rather than having a proper policy debate about what is in the interests of this country.
	I want to make one more thing absolutely clear. Road pricing and road charging cannot and must not become yet another stealth tax on the motorists of Britain. Our view is that they should be about congestion management and improving transport, but we will not support the Government in their plan for an early move to a national road- pricing scheme. Indeed, the Secretary of State himself may be back-tracking on the plan. At the past two Transport questions he used the word "if" about a national scheme rather than "when". Perhaps he has realised the risks in taking such a step.
	Apart from the civil rights debates that would have to accompany the introduction of any such scheme, it would probably be the biggest IT project this country has ever seen: tracking every car on every road for24 hours a day; collecting the data, processing it, issuing a bill and collecting the money. As we have noticed, the Government have not had triumphant success in running major IT projects, so for them in particular that one would certainly be a bridge too far.
	The Government are also missing another essential element of any road-pricing strategy. They cannot take steps to price people off the roads without giving them better choices and alternatives. It is simply not good enough to say that people need to change their working patterns to avoid paying more. Are schools to start late or at different times so that teachers can go to work later? Are hospitals to open late so that nurses and porters can avoid the rush hour? If there is to be increased use of road pricing as a means of managing congestion, public transport improvements must come first. That is where the Government seem all at sea in their plans for the future, and where Sir Rod's focus on incremental improvements, in a report about 2015 and beyond, seem so misplaced.
	The problems are today, not in 10 years' time. The country needs action now to deliver the changes that are needed.

Chris Grayling: Is the hon. Gentleman aware, first, that bus ridership in London is falling significantly and, secondly, that the subsidy required to run London's buses has risen fivefold, to a total in excess of £500 million a year? Many Members who represent other cities would love to have access to that sort of finance for their bus networks.

Chris Grayling: I am intrigued by the fact that although the subsidy has risen, passenger ridership is falling in London. I realise that he is very excited at the prospect of seeing the next Government's transport policies, but he will have to wait a little longer for the details.

Chris Grayling: I want to make some progress. I have taken up a lot of time and other Members want to speak.
	In the document we published last week, we setout a number of areas where we think transport improvements must be a priority. We will need to improve transport capacity for commuters into and around the City of London and Canary Wharf. The future of London as a major financial centre is of paramount importance to our economy. The capacity challenges on our rail networks, in particular, represent a brake on the future growth of London, and must be addressed.
	We need to address the question of transport provision in designated growth areas in the south-east, such as the Thames Gateway, if the major development plans for those areas are to go ahead. It would be utterly untenable to pursue development on the scale envisaged without adequate provision of transport infrastructure. As a Kent MP, the Minister of State, the hon. Member for South Thanet (Dr. Ladyman), must understand that. I continue to be amazed that the Government have completely failed to understand the inability of the infrastructure in the south-east to cope with the scale of development they are planning.
	At the same time, we need a renewed focus onthe trans-Pennine links between Liverpool, Greater Manchester and west Yorkshire. Congestion on key arteries in the north-west and west Yorkshire is one of the key transport challenges we face. Failure to address the problem will act as a brake on the economy of the two areas, and will also have an adverse effect on quality of life.
	There is inadequate capacity on transport links to the west of England and the economy of the west country is clearly affected by the limitations of the infrastructure in and out of the region. The Labour Government have not focused sufficiently on measures to improve the situation.
	We also need to address congestion in and around Birmingham—the hon. Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Ms Stuart) knows well what a problem it is. As well as being one of our biggest urban and business centres, Birmingham suffers from being a major junction point on both our road and our rail networks. There is an urgent need to deal with the problems that combination presents.
	We must not forget access to public transport in rural areas, where it is extremely limited in too many places. The Government seem set on reducing, or even closing, rail services in the areas that escaped the Beeching cuts.
	In the last few weeks, and during this debate, Labour Members have been leaping to their feet to demand detailed information about future Conservative plans. I can tell them that those regional priorities are issues for today—not for the next general election, in perhaps three and a half years time, but today. I hope the Government will get on with the job now. If they do not, my colleagues and I will be delighted to pass on a message about government in action to the electorate in those areas.
	Transport has been a model case study of the failures of the Government. There have been good intentions and high sounding words about the need for improvement, there has been seemingly endless planning and strategising, and there have been big increases in budgets, but the reality on the ground, out in the country, is that promised improvements are simply not coming to pass. It is not that nothing has got better. After the amount of money that the Government have spent, I would have been horrified if nothing had changed. There have been some improvements. The west coast main line is an example. However, the things that have happened are only a small part of the long list of promises that have been made and have not been turned into reality. Britain is becoming more and more congested by the day. Let us make Eddington the last report about our transport needs. Let us stop chewing over all the things that need to be done. It is time that Ministers actually got on with the job.

Douglas Alexander: I can assure the hon. Gentleman that it does not take much time, or share of mind, to come up with arguments against nationalism.
	The decisions that we have taken on macro-economic policy since 1997 mean that the UK economy has been stronger and more stable than any other major economy in the world. That has allowed us to invest more in our transport system. All that stands in stark contrast to the Conservatives' 18 years in government, which saw two of the deepest recessions of the last century and therefore a policy of stop-go funding in relation to transport, with year-on-year budgets and arbitrary cuts to transport spending. By contrast, by next year, transport spending will have increased by more than 50 per cent. in real terms above its level in the last year the Conservatives were in office.

Douglas Alexander: No, I am keen to make a little progress, because I think that all Opposition Members will be interested in this point. Where do the transport spokesmen on the Conservative Front Bench stand on the issue of investment for transport? Only today, no doubt in anticipation of this evening's debate, the shadow Transport Minister, the hon. Member for Wimbledon, called for corporation taxes to be cut to15 per cent., at a cost of more than £20 billion, and small business taxes to be cut to 10 per cent. I can understand why, after years of underinvestment, a botched privatisation, neglect of the bus network and cuts is the roads budget, the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell had so little to say about his party's record in government. However, on reflection, perhaps the reason why he said so little about his present transport policy is that he has so little money to spend. He cannot, with any credibility, will the end on transport, but not commit the means.

Douglas Alexander: I assure the hon. Lady that we support the zonal fares system. I think that the system has won widespread support throughout the capital because of the simplification that it offers. If any Conservative Front-Bench spokesman wishes to take this opportunity to put on record their opposition to zonal faring, I will be very interested to hear them, as will many commuters in London.
	It is against the backdrop of sustained investment that, for the first time, the Government will next year publish fully costed and independently agreed proposals for rail for the next five years. Those proposals will be set in the context of an even longer-term framework. In contrast, we are now beginning to discover just how little the official Opposition have learned from the botched privatisation that they inflicted on the railways. Far from apologising for rail privatisation, the Conservative party has in fact learned nothing from it, as we can see from its latest so-called strategy document that was published last week, which includes plenty of warm words about integrated organisations. Just as the Tories botched rail privatisation in the 1980s by fragmenting the network, they are now apparently proposing a further fragmentation by breaking up Network Rail. The party that broke up the rail network now proposes new plans to fragment the railways further. Its message to the public seems clear: "Sorry we took a mallet to the railways. Do you like our new mallet?"

Douglas Alexander: I concur absolutely, as does Sir Rod Eddington when he recognises that we are dealing with the symptoms of success. We have brought stability not only to the rail industry, following the Conservative's botched privatisation, but to the economy. The stability of the economy is the basis on which we are able to secure investment. The fundamental difficulty for Conservative Members is that they cannot will the ends without willing the means. They are ideologically determined to impose tax cuts and massive public spending cuts, yet their record of economic stewardship suggests that they would not be able to run the economy, even if they were minded to put in the place the kind of investment that we have seen in recent years.
	On the roads, our approach is to provide better real-time information for road users, to strengthen the management of the existing road network, to target investment where it is warranted, and to work with local authorities on road pricing pilots to tackle congestion in local areas. In a recent debate in the House, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary responded to his shadow by declaring:
	"consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds".—[ Official Report, 23 November 2006; Vol. 453, c. 708.]
	That phrase came to mind during a single paragraph of my opposite number's speech when he said not only that we needed decisive action, but that he wanted slower action on road pricing. That does not sound like the most consistent policy that I have ever heard from the Conservative party.
	More than 1,100 traffic officers are now deployed across the motorway network to help to assist traffic flow after accidents and incidents, and the national traffic control centre and the seven regional control centres monitor our motorways to keep traffic moving and congestion to a minimum. However, with nearly33 million vehicles now on our roads, compared with 26 million in 1996, and given that the number of cars has gone up by about 60 per cent. in the past 20 years, a position of simply building more roads is not tenable.
	After decades of neglect and underinvestment, the Government have tried not just to right the wrongs of the past, but to build a transport system that is fit for the challenges that lie ahead in the 21st century.

Alistair Carmichael: We touched briefly on the question of Crossrail, which I know is a matter near and dear to my hon. Friend's heart, who struggles on the Crossrail Committee. Whatever is stated in the report about Crossrail is fairly supportive of the concept—that is, Sir Rod Eddington is supportive of the concept, but again, he recognises that there is a substantial financial commitment to be made by the Government. There is not much point in getting too excited about Crossrail unless and until that commitment is made. The report was, perhaps, a missed opportunity in that respect, as it was commissioned by the Chancellor. Something more trenchant on the subject of Crossrail might have elicited a rather more detailed and meaningful response from the Treasury than we have had to date. However, we have the pre-Budget report tomorrow, and who knows what we might learn then.
	In relation to the conclusion about the extra runway for Heathrow, I much prefer the view of Stephen Joseph of Transport 2000, who said:
	"Eddington's insistence, with Nicholas Stern, that aviation should pay its full environmental, social and economic costs make the Government's 'predict and provide' approach outdated. By 2050, aviation will account for 46 per cent. of UK carbon emissions."
	It is not lost on me, at least, that Eddington's starting point in relation to aviation is an acceptance of the Government's White Paper. I do not share that acceptance. I think the aviation White Paper is deeply flawed. It is remarkable that Eddington was prepared to take it as his starting point, when the Secretary of State is currently engaged in what purports to be a review of that White Paper. I wonder whether Sir Rod Eddington had some steer as to the likely outcome of the Secretary of State's review.

Martin Salter: That is now on the record and I proudly add it to my list.
	I have no hesitation in stating that a measure of responsibility for the appalling Paddington train crash in 1999, which cost 31 lives, with many more injured, including some of my constituents, does not lie just at the door of Thames Trains. The finger of blames also points directly at those who privatised our railways and introduced a culture of greed, cuts in staff training and cuts in safety standards.
	The Tories are the last people to lecture anyone on rail policy. In fact, they have admitted as much themselves, as we have heard today with apologies for the privatisation of the railways. The shadow Transport Secretary has previously made it perfectly clear that the Conservatives have not had a clear transport policy, but only tactical positions. I will return shortly to tactical positions that they have adopted on transport issues.
	I want to talk about a transport vision for the Thames valley. I think that it is fair to say that I have always been prepared to work on a cross-party basis on issues where a consensus can be achieved. As such, I have been pleased to work with hon. Members from Berkshire and with Thames Valley Economic Partnership in drawing up a six- point plan for investment in the Thames valley transport infrastructure. That plan, entitled "Thames Valley—Sustaining our Success", was presented to Transport Ministers this morning by a delegation including representatives of major Thames Valley companies such as Dell, Oracle, Prudential, Siemens, Microsoft and Vodafone, together with the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs. May), my hon. Friend the Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart), and myself—but sadly not the hon. Member for Reading, East (Mr. Wilson), who has now left the Chamber. The plan states that
	"the thriving Thames Valley provides the thrust of Britain's economic success. Its businesses and the people who work here generate a larger slice of revenue for the government than anywhere outside central London. Europe's leading financial centre is dependent on support from the global companies based in the Thames Valley for the operation of their systems.
	A modern, well-ordered road system coupled with highly efficient public transport is also a pre-requisite for success. People need to be able to get to and from work quickly, safely, cheaply, and with a minimum of stress. Those buying or selling goods and services need to have access to fast, reliable transport. Since the Thames Valley is a location of choice as European or global headquarters for many businesses, travellers need to be able to make fast, seamless connections to London Heathrow Airport. Unfortunately the present infrastructure is failing the economy of the Thames Valley."
	I should like to put on record my thanks to the Under-Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Lincoln (Gillian Merron), for the patient way in which she listened to that comprehensive presentation from members of all political parties and from some very powerful players in the Thames valley economy.
	The six priorities identified for investment, totalling between £1.5 billion and £2 billion, are as follows. First, and most importantly, there is the proposed Reading station upgrade to remove the bottlenecks on the Great Western main line. Secondly, there is the proposed AirTrack scheme, which BAA has announced that it intends to promote and which will provide rail access to Heathrow airport. Thirdly, there is the proposal for a direct link to Heathrow from the west via the Great Western main line. It is an utter disgrace that although we have the driving force of the Thames valley economy and companies that deliberately located there because of the proximity to the M4, to London and to Heathrow airport, we have no direct rail access to the major airport covering not only this capital but this country. Fourthly, there is the proposal to upgrade the north-south linkages in the Thames valley, particularly the M3 to M4 to M40 road connections. Fifthly, and more controversially, there is the proposal to widen the M4 on a phased basis—luckily not around Reading but around Slough and Maidenhead. Sixthly, there is the proposal to provide a Thames valley rapid transport system. All those schemes require significant public investment, and it is highly unlikely that any of them would see the light of day under a Conservative spending regime, past or present. However, as I said, I am pleased with the positive reception that the Minister gave us, even if she did not get her cheque book out this morning.
	I want to highlight the Conservatives' political positioning on three of those six schemes—political positioning to which they have already owned up. The first of the schemes is the upgrading of the north-south M4-M40 road connections. In Reading, that would mean the construction of the long-awaited third Thames bridge, a proposal that is promoted by Wokingham and Reading councils, but blocked by the Oxfordshire Tories. In fact, the Tory tactical positioning is so complex that the hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Johnson) will not even sit in the same room as the right hon. Members for Maidenhead, and for Wokingham (Mr. Redwood), and the hon. Member for Reading, East, and myself to discuss the third Thames bridge, which we all support, and which our constituents desperately need. There comes a point when seeking refuge in the argument of localism cuts no ice, because there are major strategic schemes that need to happen, and parish-pump politics cannot be allowed to get in the way.
	Secondly, I want to mention the scheme for rail access to Heathrow airport. That, at least, is an issue on which we can all agree, but it is far from clear how such rail access will be achieved. In my evidence to the Select Committee on the Crossrail Bill, I argued strongly for the inclusion of a western rail link to Heathrow. Although that is not part of the original Crossrail scheme, it will be an opportunity lost if we do not use Crossrail to resolve one of the major bugbears facing business travellers and commuters in the region. Figures presented to the Minister today by theThames Valley Economic Partnership show that the major companies in the region spend no less than£8.25 million a year on taxis to run customers and clients to London's Heathrow airport from places such as Vodafone's premises in Newbury, and Microsoft and Oracle's premises in Reading, all because we do not have proper rail access. Those cabs pour out carbon emissions and clog up the roads. I doubt whether Crossrail will ever provide the immediate solution that we seek, which is why I support the AirTrack proposals from BAA, and I encourage hon. Members to do likewise. That will deliver rail access from Reading via Bracknell, Wokingham and Staines.
	Finally, I turn to the upgrade of Reading station. Reading is the second busiest station outside London, providing direct train services to more than 360 towns and cities across Britain, as well as coach services to three of the four terminals at Heathrow airport. More than 20 million passengers use the station interchange each year, some of whom connect to it by one of more than 200 buses and coaches that serve it during peak hours. The station does not have enough platforms or track capacity to accommodate the frequency of services, especially at peak times. That is coupled with a busy junction at Reading West, which is heavily used by south-north freight services. The result is that passenger services are held up by congestion. That bottleneck affects the reliability of rail services across a vast region, from Paddington as far north as Birmingham, and from south Wales to the extreme south-west.
	A core scheme addressing some of the issues has already been developed. It would cost £68 million and could deliver substantial benefits to the region. The core scheme has been worked up by the Reading Station Partnership Board, which is led by Reading borough council and which comprises representatives from the Government office for the south-east, Network Rail, the South East England Development Agency, SERA and the Department for Transport. A formal bid was submitted in March this year. Ministers have acknowledged, in the House, the need to upgrade Reading station, for all the reasons that I have given. We await the final assessment of the Reading Station Partnership Board with some confidence and much hope.
	Unfortunately, that is the point at which consensus breaks down and good old Tory tactical positioning rears its ugly head again. There was an excellent degree of cross-party support for the Thames Valley Economic Partnership submission, but by stark contrast, the submission on the Reading station upgrade was the subject of silly party political games by the hon. Member for Reading, East, to whom I gave notice of the fact that I would refer to him in this debate. He has been utterly shameless in trying to claim credit for the hard work of others—so shameless, in fact, that his conduct is worthy of the Liberal Democrats. That should surprise no one; after all, he once stood for election as part of the Alliance between the Social Democratic party and the Liberals, before he discovered his undying allegiance to the Conservative party.
	Instead of working in partnership with Reading borough council and the members of the Reading Station Partnership Board, which was formed in 2001—well before the hon. Gentleman became an MP—he has tried to undermine the work of the board by seeking to set up his own stakeholder group, to which no other elected representatives in Reading are invited. He tries to drum up support for early-day motions that imply that the Government are blocking progress on Reading station, when in fact Ministers have been most encouraging and supportive. However, all his spin and blustering have been to no avail—he is well and truly rumbled. Only 11 MPs have signed early-day motion 2810, and the long-suffering stakeholders have recently asked him to operate on a cross-party basis and in a less partisan manner.
	Only last week, the hon. Gentleman pleaded with the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, South (Mr. Harris) to grant his alternative Reading station partnership board a meeting in December. That meeting may take place next year, but the hon. Member for Reading, East will be overtaken by events, because it is with great pleasure that I can announce that the Secretary of State has kindly agreed to my request to meet the real Reading Station Partnership Board on 19 December to receive a full presentation of its excellent bid, which makes a powerful case for upgrading the capacity of Reading station, improving services on the Great Western main line and providing better facilities for passengers at Reading. The Tory transport hypocrisy continues. The hon. Member for Reading, East plays his pathetic partisan games but, in the end, it will be a Labour Government who deliver the Reading station upgrade and, hopefully, many more transport schemes that are badly needed in the Thames valley.

Peter Atkinson: With respect to the Chair, who may not wish us to continue to debate the subject, may I tell the hon. Gentleman that I, too, am a keen fisherman, but I support hunting?
	It is a pity that the Secretary of State did not deal more fully with the Eddington report, which is an indictment of Government inaction over the past nine and a half years. It applies just as much to 2000 as to 2007, because it identifies critical problems that were in evidence then and that have resulted in seven years of virtual inactivity by the Government. It contains much that is good, but it also has some serious flaws. My hon. Friend the Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling), for example, pointed out that Sir Rod detracted from the abilities of locally elected democracies to determine big transport infrastructure problems. Today's report by Kate Barker seeks to establish an independent planning commission to take over from local government the role of dealing with large infrastructure problems, which is regrettable.
	I hope that when my hon. Friends write their manifestos on transport and other issues, they will sweep away the regional structure set up by the Deputy Prime Minister, including regional spatial strategy, regional transport planning boards and, of course,the grand panjandrum of the regional assemblies. If they went, along with the independent planning commission, it would do a great deal to restore local democracy. Large-scale transport infrastructure planning in localised and regional areas should be undertaken by a combination of locally elected councillors, who, knowing the circumstances better, are better able to take those decisions.
	I agree with certain points raised by the Eddington report. In his well titled report, "The Case for Action"—the Government should have taken note of that—under the heading of "Key economic challenge", he says that
	"the Government should prioritise action on those parts of the system where the networks are critical in supporting economic growth and there are clear signals that those networks are not performing."
	There could be no better local example of an under-performing key route than the A1 Newcastle western bypass—the busiest stretch of dual carriageway in the entire UK. It is jammed in the morning, jammed at the weekends when people go shopping at the Metro centre, one of the largest in Europe, and jammed again in the rush hour at night. That road is causing a serious economic drag on the north-east of England.
	Car ownership is increasing faster in the north-east than in any other region—admittedly from a low base— but there are no plans to improve the A1. A few months ago, a plan was promised to try to manage the traffic better and increase capacity. I understand that the report was promised for about this time, but I am now told that it will not be published until winter 2007. Meanwhile, the economic problems get worse.
	This is not just a matter, incidentally, of Christmas special pleading in the manner of the hon. Member for Reading, West. It is a much more serious matter. What has happened in the north-east is the result of the road structures of the A1 and the A19. Proposed new industrial and commercial developments have been frozen by the Highways Agency's serving what are called article 14 orders on the development plan. Those orders effectively put a stop to development for up to six months and can then be renewed.
	I know that the Minister of State is aware ofthe particular problem with article 14 orders and the damage that they have caused to the economy of the north-east. I am pleased to say that most of them have now been lifted, but the abiding legacy of the threat of article 14 orders is that quite a lot of developers who would have developed regional projects have been frightened off. To delay a development for six, 12 or in some cases 18 months—as has happened—means that a developer incurs losses of many millions of pounds, particularly on large developments. They do not want to take that risk, which means we have lost the opportunity to create a large number of new jobs in the region.
	The deadening impact of those orders and of the poor infrastructure relating to the two crucial routes in the north-east has been the subject of an excellent campaign by the North East chamber of commerce, well supported by the local media, particularly  The Journal and the  Evening Chronicle. The campaign is called "Go for Jobs" and I know that the Minister is aware of it. Last month, it won the North East chamber of commerce an award for being the best campaigning chamber.
	Sir Rod Eddington specifies the importance of good transport links in the growing economy of a region such as the north-east. As he states in recommendation 10, to which I hope the Government will pay attention:
	"Government should focus on these areas"—
	he is talking about the inter-urban corridors and congested urban areas—
	"because they are heavily used, of growing economic importance, and showing signs of congestion and unreliability—and these problems are set to get significantly worse."
	That illustrates precisely the problem facing the north-east because of the failure to invest in new and crucial road systems. So I ask the Minister, please may we have some grown-up, joined-up government when dealing with transport in the region?
	The region's budget for transport has been settled at £457 million for the next 10 years. That is a trivial amount for a region where there is a shortage of decent transport infrastructure. If we compare that with Scotland, just across the border—I am sorry that the Secretary of State is not here—it is interesting to note that £3.5 billion has been allocated for transport infrastructure there in the next decade. I admit that the country has a population of about three times the size of that of the north-east, but one can see how disproportionate spending in Scotland is compared with that in the north-east of England.
	I add my support to a high-speed link between London and the north and Scotland. It is wrong ofSir Ron to dismiss it so simplistically—it is capable of improving the economy and we should support it.

Kitty Ussher: I am sure that Liberal Democrat proposals for that will prove interesting.
	Each hon. Member probably has a travelling tale to tell since such a large part of the job involves being in two places at once. I can speak only from my experiences but I think that the story is telling. My predecessor, Peter Pike, who was a Member of Parliament during the years when the Conservative party was in power often flew between London and Manchester because the trains were so unreliable. Thanks to the recent improvements to the west coast main line under the Government—I am delightedthat the Conservative party acknowledges the improvements, although it opposed the funding for them—it is now far more time efficient to take the train. I travel to Manchester or Stockport in around two hours, which is fantastic. From there, it is less than an hour's drive to the constituency.
	That was a simple example with which to begin my contribution, but it proves the point. When, as consumers, we are faced with several options, we choose the easiest one. Thanks to the improvements to the railways under the Government, the easiest is often to travel by train. Our constituents are doing that, so I do not recognise the picture that Conservative Members paint.
	Let me present some facts that I do recognise. Investment in Britain's transport infrastructure will be 60 per cent. higher next year than it was 10 years ago. It needs more investment in the future, which we are providing, yet Conservative Members were unable to say this evening whether they would prioritise that investment over tax cuts. That was revealing.
	The Tories botched privatisation and starved the railways of the investment that they needed. They brought the railways to their knees; we have brought them the stability from which they can grow. Forty per cent. of trains have been replaced in the past five years; passenger numbers are growing at the fastest rate since the 1960s; passengers miles are growing at the fastest rate since the 1940s; and rail freight has increased by40 per cent. since 1997.
	When the Conservative party was in charge, Railtrack was laying as little as 250 miles of track a year. In 2003-04, Labour's replacement for Railtrack, Network Rail, was laying well over three times that, replacing 870 miles of track that year. That leads to this evening's all important question: why is the Conservative party implying that the improvements are long overdue when the work is being done and we have a sustained strategy for them? I can conclude only that it is up to its old tricks. In the words, which areworth repeating, of the Conservative Transport spokesperson, the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling) about his party,
	"we've not had a clear transport strategy...we've had tactical positions".
	Tonight's debate is about another tactical position adopted by the Opposition. The country is getting used to this, and it is responding by asking, "Where isthe policy?" The answer is that the policy is all overthe place. The right hon. Member for Witney (Mr. Cameron) said a year ago that Britain needed a concerted programme of road building, yet the chair of his policy commission on quality of life—that title amuses me all by itself—has said that there is no doubt that there must be an assumption against road building. The only thing that I am left in no doubt about is that the only way to get a coherent policy on railways is to stick to the one that we have.
	That is not to say that action does not need to be taken, however, but let us be clear about what is going on. We have economic growth, better trains, and greater reliability leading to trains becoming more popular. That creates more demand, which is creating the greater need for investment. I agree with the Conservatives when they say that if they were in power, we would not be in this situation. When they were in power, we did not have the sustained economic growth, quarter on quarter, year on year, that we have seen for the past 10 years. Nor did we get the necessary investment in the trains or the track. So it is no wonder that people did not want to travel on the railways. Does that count as success, in the Conservatives' book? The overcrowding on some parts of the railway network, which we are addressing, is a symptom of our success. The question for the public out there is whether they would rather have a party that is committed to the long-term sustainable future of the network or one that is unable to say whether rail investment ranks as more or less important than tax cuts for the well-off.
	I shall give the House a local example. Manchester is experiencing a renaissance; it is booming. Obviously, the combined effect of a Labour council and a Labour Government has worked well. Of course, there are good jobs to be had, and my constituents up the road in east Lancashire want to have them. So the trains and buses into Manchester from my part of the world are crowded. The Conservatives try to make political capital out of this symptom of our success. Would they prefer it if there were no opportunities in our great northern cities that people wanted to travel to take advantage of? Sometimes that seems to be the case.
	Yes, success has led to issues that need addressing, and they are being addressed as part of the routine policy of this Government. In the north-west, it is timely that Network Rail is currently out to consultation on its rail utilisation study. As Members will know, this contains proposals as to where future passenger demand is likely to come from, and what changes will be required to the necessary infrastructure. Network Rail, created by this Government, is adapting to the challenges faced by the network over time. I welcome this study, and also the opportunity to explain how it can be used to improve the job opportunities available to my constituents.
	Burnley is a mere 30 miles from Manchester, but there is no direct train line between them. My constituents either get the bus—which offers a decent service but is not always reliable at peak rush hour times—or they have to change trains at Blackburn or Hebden Bridge or, I am sorry to say, they give up their jobs in the city. I do not think that people should have to choose between their careers and their communities in that way—

Charles Walker: That's Labour.

Charles Walker: That's Labour.

Kitty Ussher: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
	I hope that Network Rail will use the opportunity of the rail utilisation study to correct this anomaly, particularly as I am told by Northern Rail, which holds the franchise in my area, that the projections of passenger numbers into the next decade that form part of the report have already been surpassed due to high economic growth in the region.
	There are various ways in which a direct line could be established. One would be to have a direct train via Blackburn, which could be done fairly easily. However, establishing a regular service would require serious investment to upgrade the heavily congested single track between Blackburn and Manchester. Or we could go round the other side of the hill and reinstate a few metres of track known as the Todmorden curve, which would allow a direct train service between Burnley and Manchester using a bit of the Calder line. Either would do, and both would be supported not only by my constituency but by the neighbouring constituencies, which would also reap economic benefits. We must remember that investing in transport infrastructure is necessary not only to relieve bottlenecks but as a tool for regeneration. People often get bogged down in the terminology of travel-to-work areas without realising that, by investing in the right infrastructure, we can enable those geographical areas to change quite substantially.
	The industrial revolution, which took place a long time ago in my part of the world, is a case in point. People often presume that the canals that criss-cross my constituency were built to take the textiles to market. In fact, it was the other way round. It was because of the existence of the Leeds-Liverpool canal, which was originally built to transport more basic commodities, that the cotton mills were built in Burnley. The same is true today: better rail links into the booming cities are a tool to regenerate towns such as mine. They will enable my constituents to commute to higher-paid jobs and make it easier for city folk to come and relax in a bit of Pennine Lancashire. The links between economic and transport policy need to be made more explicit. I am hopeful that the Government's response to the Eddington report will accept that.
	I welcome the increased investment in our railways under the Government. I welcome the greater prosperity and opportunity that economic stability has brought. I believe that the public do, too, and are voting with their feet and choosing to travel by train. That leads to capacity issues, which we are sorting out. As part of that, I hope that my plea for better transport links between my constituency and Manchester in particular will be heard. As this is an Opposition day debate, my question to the Conservative party is simple: is it simply positioning itself once more, or will it put its so-called commitment to the railways above its commitment to cut taxes for the better-off?

Christopher Fraser: I welcome this Opposition day debate, as it is on an important subject close to the heart of many people who live in Norfolk.
	I have raised with the Minister on many occasions the urgent need for the Government to address the roads infrastructure in Norfolk, particularly the A11, which is one of the most important links between the county and the rest of the United Kingdom. In particular, he knows that an eight-mile stretch of single carriageway remains between Thetford and the Fiveways corner roundabout, which leaves Norfolk as the only county, and Norwich as the largest settlement, not connected to the national, dual carriageway trunk road network. The road cannot cope with the existing weight of traffic, let alone that which the proposed 72,000 new homes in the county, and the welcome regeneration of Thetford, will bring.
	Norfolk county council has provided me with a copy of the East of England Development Agency's policy document for economic growth in the county. It is optimistically entitled, "Norfolk on the Move". I tell the Minister that Norfolk's drivers know that they are likely to grind to a halt through the sheer weight of traffic on the county's roads. The problems of the A11 are stifling the economy of the area. The business community, utterly frustrated by unfulfilled promises and ever-growing delays on that stretch of road, has rolled in behind our local authorities. A compelling case was submitted to the regional assembly. The scheme is, at least for now, scheduled for the second regional funding allocation funding period starting in 2010.
	The Minister has acknowledged, however, in an interview with the  Eastern Daily Press, that the operation of the regional allocation arrangements is problematic, and leads to mistakes and skewed priorities. He identified the "whale in the pond" syndrome, which tends to de-prioritise very large schemes that eat up a substantial proportion of a region's funding. He also acknowledged that areas on the geographical edge of a region could be overlooked in the decision-making process. To my constituents in South-West Norfolk, and to those in the surrounding area, it seems that they are constantly overlooked in the decision-making process. If evidence were needed, they cite the number of times that the dualling project has been promised and then delayed. Will the Minister accept that what he has called a "good and popular scheme" has suffered from both those factors? Will he seek to re-designate it as being of national importance, just as economic development in Norfolk should be of national importance?
	Will the Minister take this opportunity to confirm that the Government will take responsibility for the scheme, and dispel the concern in Norfolk that it may yet be put on the back burner, leaving us isolated and frustrated by a roads infrastructure that is not fit for purpose? Will he also acknowledge his support for the dualling of the A11 and join me in calling on the Secretary of State for Transport to approve it, so that a timetable can be drawn up and work can start immediately?
	At Attleborough in my constituency, there is yet another example of the Government washing their hands of the A11. Thankfully, that stretch of the road is about to be dualled. However, the Government have turned down a simple scheme to upgrade the nearest junction on the A11 at Besthorpe, which would route traffic away from an ever-congested Attleborough town. If carried out at the same time as dualling work, the project would have offered an economical and simple solution.
	The Government have refused an application for funding under the demonstration scheme, passing the scheme back to the county council, which does not have the funds to finance it. It will have to be carried out as a separate and therefore more expensive project, offering poor value to the taxpayer and yet more years of misery for the local community. Yet again, the Government's transport strategy fails to recognise the need for sensible investment in our roads, and best value for the taxpayer once again goes out the window.
	In a debate last November I raised concerns about the state of the A47 in Norfolk and called for it to be dualled as well. The road is, in many places, unsafe and unfit for the weight of traffic that it carries. Accidents are frequent and often serious, and can have a catastrophic impact on travel across the area. It is one of the most dangerous routes in the country, yet improvements on the A47 are also considered of regional, not national importance. I say again to the Minister that the responsibility lies with the Government.
	The Minister has told me that his Department is not revisiting the method of defining road projects, but is reviewing how it works in practice. He has made time to visit Norfolk before, and I ask him to make time to come up again. Then he will see for himself how the regional allocation method works in practice and how Norfolk faces ever increasing difficulties while the method remains in place.

Si�n James: I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute to the debate. We should highlight the Government's commitment to rail transport. More rail journeys are being undertaken in Britain than at any time since the 1940s. Rail freight is up by 46 per cent. since 1997. More trains in England and Wales arrive on time compared with 2001, mainly as a result of the increased investment after many years of neglect under the Conservative Government. I have worked in the rail industry and know from first-hand experience about the challenges of clearing up the mess left by that Government. The need to push forward an integrated transport agenda has been key within the industry.
	Unfortunately, the performance of First Great Westernthe mainline operator to my constituencyhas not been so effective or matched the Government's commitment to improve rail transport. It has been named as one of the worst performing franchises in Britain, with a 79.4 per cent. reliability record. It has also recently announced changes to services to Swansea, which has caused great concern to my constituents. In particular, they are worried about the termination of the 1515 London Paddington to Swansea service at Cardiff. The changes will have a serious effect on Swansea's status as a mainline station on an important inter-city route. The proposals are a retrograde step and are being interpreted locally as downgrading the second city of Wales. Swansea is an important rail city and a key business and tourism destination; it is also the gateway to west Wales. The proposals appear to make passengers from Swansea and west Wales less important than those in other parts of the country.

Julie Morgan: I support my hon. Friend's remarks about First Great Western. If the service beyond Cardiff is going to stop, the service to Cardiff may soon stop as well. It shows a lack of interest in Wales on the part of First Great Western. Is she aware of the proposal to cut the buffet service between Cardiff and Paddington, which I have received a complaint about? Does she think that that is a strange way of improving the rail service?

Si�n James: I certainly do. It highlights the factthat a company that was recently engaged in a re-franchising process, when it made many promises, is now making cuts at will and making changes that suit it, not the people that it is supposed to be serving.
	The passenger flows between Swansea and Cardiff are vital to a number of local communities and businesses, and for economic development. Not everyone needs or has to travel to London on a regular basis. The daily commuter journeys between Swansea, stations along the south Wales main line and Cardiff are equally important. The commitment of First Great Western to those services is essential. As I said, it actively pursued the franchise and I am disappointed that the fine words and promises contained in its bid now appear to be nothing more than window dressing. It has ignored all representations about the 1515 service. I believe that that service is being killed off by First Great Western's failure to consult properly. The consultation period has been little more than a sham. There has been a poor response from First Great Western, which has refused to publish any submissions and has not made its decisions public before the point of implementation, thus in effect allowing no appeal.
	Following closely on the heels of the refranchise bid, there has been much confusion. It is understandable that the public, who believed that the franchise proposals submitted by First Great Western would be in place for a credible period, have been left feeling confused and let down by yet more inadequate consultation.
	The company apparently has no interest in serving evening commuters. Between 5 am and 8.30 am, there is a half-hourly service between Swansea and London. Eight trains, each carrying up to 360 seated passengers, travel the Swansea-to-Paddington route. During that period Arriva Trains Wales runs two services which can carry a combined total of 300. Several thousand are carried by First Great Western; a few hundred are carried by Arriva Trains Wales. But how do those people make their return journey in the evening? First Great Western is happy to take their business in the morning, but feels no responsibility for getting them home at night. What kind of strategy and what kind of franchise commitment is that?
	Poor Arriva Trains Wales will now be expected to fill the gap left by the removal of the 1515 from the timetable. Commuters anxious to get home after a hard day's work will have to try to obtain seats on an already popular service. It is the proverbial attempt to fit a pint into a half-pint pot, and can only mean more inconvenience and discomfort for the loyal passengers whom First Great Western are happily abandoning. I fear that many will switch to their cars and that we will see more congestion and pollutionproblems that we should be working to decrease, not increase.
	I urge my hon. Friend the Minister to do his utmost to ensure that the people of Swansea and west Wales continue to benefit from increased investment, reliable trains and improving services.

Maria Miller: It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Swansea, East (Mrs. James). I know her area well. It seems that we share the problem of overcrowded trains, although our constituencies are many miles apart. I am pleased to see that the hon. Member for Burnley (Kitty Ussher) is still present. I was interested by her speech, in which said she did not recognise the situation described earlier by many of my hon. Friends. I hope that I shall be able to give her some more specific examples of problems that my constituents face daily.
	In my constituency, as well as those of many other Members, a huge expansion in house building is taking place. About 800 houses a year are being built in Basingstoke, butI fearwithout the investment in infrastructure that would enable more people to settle in our part of Hampshire without any negative effect on the current population. Transport links are a particularly good example of the problems of investment in infrastructure, but there are many other examples, including essential utilities and services. Energy, water supply and other important elements of infrastructure are not being planned well enough, or receiving enough investment, to match the level of house building required by the Government.
	Last week saw the publication of the Eddington report, to which many Members have referred today. It is the latest in a long line of transport documents published since 1997. Sir Rod Eddington made three important points. He called on the Government to focus policy and sustained investment on improving the performance of existing transport networks in those places that are important to the UK's economic success.
	He went on to say:
	Government, together with the private sector, should deliver sustained and targeted infrastructure investment in those schemes which deliver high returns.
	He emphasised that
	the policy process needs to be rigorous and systematic.
	Those are fine-sounding words, but this is the eighth major document on transport from the Government in nine years. There have been two White Papers, a 10-year plan, and now the Eddington report.

Maria Miller: I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention, but he is, I think, being rather fair-minded to the Government by suggesting that that is their intention. My Basingstoke constituents might have a slightly different spin on that when they look at the amount of house building that is required in north Hampshire and then look at the dearth of funding that follows that centrally driven Government target. The amount of reports, White Papers and documentation that has been produced on the sector under discussion seems to mask a confusion, inconsistency and short-sightedness in transport planning; that is certainly the case in my area of the country.
	My constituency of Basingstoke is just the sort of place that Eddington highlighted in his report as requiring a focused policy of investment in transport. It is home to 69,000 jobs. It has one of the largest concentrations of employment in the entire south-east of England, and it is therefore an integral part of the future of this country. The Government have called it one of their diamonds for growth; others have called it part of the string of pearls. They are fine words, but fine words cannot mask the disconnect between house building targets and the lack of investment in infrastructure. The Government need places like Basingstoke to generate the wealth to fund their spending plans, so they need to be prepared to invest in areas such as Basingstoke to ensure that its success is sustainable in the future.
	We cannot have commuters spending hours in traffic jams on the M3 motorway. There has also recently been a significant increase in the number of accidents on our section of the motorway, some of which, tragically, have resulted in fatalities. We in north Hampshire have not had sufficient investment, particularly in our motorways and roads.
	There are other local examples of lack of investment. There is a major business park in my constituency: the Chineham business park is a highly successful area of economic activity, and it is home to many blue-chip companies and major names that Members will be aware of. A part of the plans for that business park was to build a railway stationMinisters might be aware of thatbut since those plans were put forward there has been a complete lack of funding, which means that it has not been possible to deliver that railway station. The result of that is being borne by my constituents who are now having to deal with major problems to do with traffic cutting through residential areas, because people do not have the option of travelling to their place of work by train rather than car.
	Local employers tell me that there are two reasons why they want to locate in Basingstoke. In some cases it is their first choice to locate, rather than Reading, because of the congestion problems in that town that the hon. Member for Reading, West (Martin Salter) highlighted. They choose Basingstoke because they have access to well qualified and highly experienced staff, but also because of accessibility. I am concerned that the large-scale house building projects that are being foisted on the local councilwith very little ability to resist themcombined with lack of investment in transport will simply be no good at all for residents or business.
	There are many estimates of how much money is required to fill the yawning infrastructure gap that there is not only in Basingstoke but throughout what is now designated by the South East England Development Agency as a western corridor area. Hampshire county council has told the South East England regional assembly that investment of some 4.5 billion is needed to improve transport infrastructure in the western corridor and Blackwater valley growth area, which, as the hon. Member for Reading, West said, is one of the most important areas of economic development in the country. In my bit of that areaBasingstokewe need no less than a250 million investment in transport alone to fill the gap created by the lack of investment in recent years.
	I ran off a list of the projects that the western corridor and Blackwater valley area needs in terms of investment in infrastructurethe document has been submitted to the Governmentand no fewer than 10 of the 34 projects on that list directly relate to my constituency. I hope that the Minister will take the opportunity when he responds to give me some thoughts on how he will help Hampshire county council and SEEDA to plug some of those gaps. The Government are happy to set targets, but they are not prepared to ensure that the plans are in place to enable such targets to be properly thought through. That is a million miles away from the integrated transport policy that they originally promised us; nearly 10 years on from their taking office, we are still waiting.
	I want to consider a couple of other examples of how the transport infrastructure gap in my constituency is not just opening up but increasing in magnitude. We have already heard a great deal about the train networks in various parts of the country. I will not dwell on that issue, except to say that my constituents not only have to endure overcrowded trains; they often have to spend an hour travelling into London, unable to sit down for the entire journeyor for the journey back. The train operator promised increases in capacity, but that has yet to become a reality. I welcome the fact that my Front-Bench colleagues have given a commitment to regarding that as an urgent problem as we develop our policies.
	There are other pressing issues in my constituency relating to the M3 motorway, which runs directly through its centre. It is an important access route and an important part of why Basingstoke is the success that it is, but a tremendous increase in traffic on that route has not been matched by investment in measures to alleviate the problems associated with congestion and noise. I have recently tabled a number of parliamentary questions on this issue because of an increase in the number of letters that I receive from constituents on it. Government calculations indicate that the level of traffic noise on the M3 between junctions 5 and 7 has increased by about 4.5 dB in the past 20 years. To many a lay person, that might not sound like an enormous increase, but I remind Members that the decibel is a logarithmic unit, and that a 3 dB increase, as the Minister doubtless knows, equates to a doubling in sound level. If Members were to stand by the side of the M3 in Mapledurwell, a beautiful village in my constituency that is completely unshielded from the motorway by any form of physical sound barrier, they would understand why many residents are deeply concerned at the fact the increase in traffic has not been matched by the provision of sound-avoidance measures.
	We thought that we had come some way on this issue under the careful guidance of my predecessor, who obtained an assurance that a noise-retardant surface would be used on the section of the M3 that passes through the centre of my constituency. Indeed, we were very pleased with the outcome of the negotiations with the Government. Only last week, however, I heard that a very firm promise might be overturned; despite a promise to re-surface the M3 completely with noise-retardant material only one lane is to be treated. That is a great disappointment to residents of the villages of Mapledurwell, Up Nateley, Nateley Scures and Old Basing, for whom that measure represented their only hope that the Government would try to alleviate a growing problem.
	The other result of increased traffic flow on the M3 that has not been coupled with a measure to try to alleviate the problem is congestion at junction 6, especially the Black Dam roundabout. All my constituents who use the M3 are very aware of that problem. The roundabout was built to accommodate a maximum peak flow of about 5,500 vehicles an hour, yet a survey last September found that it was already operating well above capacity, and the Government have no plans to try to improve the situation in the near future, despite significant amounts of house building.
	There is a pressing need to upgrade that key section of the motorway, yet when I asked the Minister of State what assessment had been made of the need to increase capacity, he merely replied:
	Agreement was reached in principle on the need to accommodate traffic resulting from the Local Plan...The Highways Agency will review the situation when the Local Plan...becomes clearer.[ Official Report, 11 November 2005; Vol. 439, c. 782W.]

Owen Paterson: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for highlighting yet another broken promise. We have heard a catalogue of them throughout the debate.
	There is no question who is to blame. In June 2001, the right hon. Member for North Tyneside (Mr. Byers) took over as Secretary of State for Transport, Local Government and the Regions. On 15 January 2002, in an interview with  The Guardian, he saidI urge Ministers to listen to this
	It's now our responsibility. There can be no more excuses, I want to draw a line in the sand. It's our responsibility. We can't blame the Tories any more.
	In the very same month, much to the chagrin of the new Secretary of State, the noble Lord Birt was brought in to advise No. 10 with blue-sky thinking on transport, but he angered the Transport Sub-Committee by refusing to appear before it to reveal his thinking. Meanwhile, the Select Committee on Transport, Local Government and the Regions published its assessment of the 10-year plana crushing assessment. The Committee said that the report was mistaken, wrong, ill balanced, incomprehensible and over-optimistic.
	On we went, and in May 2002 the right hon. Member for North Tyneside resigned, to be replaced by the right hon. Member for Edinburgh, South-West (Mr. Darling). In December, the new Secretary of State unveiled a new 5.5 billion package of transport improvements, but revealed that the Government had spectacularly miscalculated the amount of traffic in Britain's roads. He warned that motorists were likely to spend up to 20 per cent. more time in traffic jams by 2010 and admitted that the targets originally set by the Deputy Prime Minister would not be met. The Government thundered on with another White Paper, The Future of Transport, which was published in July 2004. It stated:
	We need a transport network that can meet the challenges of a growing economy and the increasing demand for travel,
	and the subsequent Labour party manifesto spoke of road pricing.
	The Government have failedthey have failed miserably. Let me cite three outside organisations in support of my case. The Confederation of British Industry has found that 86 per cent. of businesses regard UK road links as important, and 94 per cent. of those companies say that congestion is a problem. This afternoon, I met representatives of the Road Users Alliance, which says that congestion is costing business 15 billion to 20 billion a year. Tim Green, the alliance's director, said that
	Traffic has grown by 29 per cent. in the last 10 years and road capacity has increased by less than 2 per cent. The Government has totally underestimated the network that is required despite having taken 400 billion in taxes from road users but having spent only 7 billion per year on roads.
	In September 2006, the survey carried out by the British Chambers of Commerce, which represents 100,000 UK companies of all sizes, showed that 80 per cent. feel that there is a problem with road congestion that affects their business locally, regionally and nationally. The British Chambers of Commerce says that we are rapidly approaching Gridlock Britain unless a determined effort is made to improve our roads, removing pinch points and managing the network better to facilitate smooth flow and reliability of journey time.
	Now, we come to the Eddington report, which is400 pages long in the Vote Office, but covers more than 1,000 pages if one includes the annexes on the internet. There are elements of the report that we strongly support. We have consistently supported the disproportionate gains of small schemes. Paragraph 199 on page 38 of the smaller volume entitled Advice to Government points out that small junction improvements often cost below 20 million, but show wider benefit:cost ratios well in excess of 4 and some going up to between 8 and 10. That was a point picked up by my hon. Friend the Member for South-West Norfolk. Many smaller road and rail schemes have been supported by Members throughout the House. Will the Government clarify tonight whether it is their intention to reinstate those schemes before 2015?
	Eddington explores at length the difficulties of our current planning system and makes radical proposals to introduce an inquisitorial system and what would effectively be guillotines on time. There is an extraordinary graph showing that the inquiry on the M6 toll took 150 days, and the terminal 5 inquiry took several years and cost 60 million. These are significant delays and costs. Do the Government intend to pursue the proposal?
	At the centre of the report is road pricing. Eddington enthusiastically supports the creation of a national road pricing scheme, on the ground that if it were introduced it would reduce the need for infrastructure capacity increases. The Opposition are convinced that the travelling public will react to the price mechanism and change their behaviour. In order to manage demand effectively, the price must vary. We do not support simplistic congestion charge schemes. A good example of the benefits of a variable road pricing scheme is the one that I saw this summer on the SR91 in southern California.
	There is a road connecting Riverside, where many people live, and Orange county. The four lanes were jammed solid morning and evening. High occupancy vehicle lanes, which the Government are keen on, were added. Sadly, those were a waste of time. They were also jammed solid morning and evening. The four HOV lanes were converted to high occupancy toll lanes, with a varying toll. The number of vehicles doubled and the speed trebled.
	We are convinced that the public will tolerate road pricing if it is variable and if it delivers improved reliability. It is also vital that revenues are ploughed back into infrastructure to maintain public confidence. But it is a huge jump from that to a national scheme. We have serious concerns. It is one thing accepting the principle of price as a tool, but it is quite another thing to bank everything on establishing the first national road pricing scheme. We heard about the huge projects that have gone wrong in the Department of Health and the Ministry of Defence.
	The Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency database holds records of 36 million vehicles and 47 million drivers, of which 68 per cent. are correct in every detail, but 10 per cent. are not. I do not underestimate the task for the DVLA, but when do the Government think there will be a watertight database? There are serious civil liberties issues involved. When TollCollect set up its scheme in Germany, the diffusion of information to any Government Department was banned.
	European directive 2004/52 deals with the interoperability of electronic toll collection systems. The crucial issue is the European electronic tolling service, which is intended to allow vehicle operators to subscribe to access any electronic charging scheme in Europe. The technology is immature. It is intimately connected to the progress of the EU's Galileo GNSS. As it was originally anticipated that EETS would not come into force for cars until 2012 and the system is already subject to delay on that timetable, do the Government consider that the regulatory and technical framework will be in place to meet the 2015 timetable?
	To summarise, the Government came to office almost 10 years ago with simplistic and dogmatic ideas that the travelling public could be forced off the roads and on to public transport. They totally underestimated the growth in traffic demand for both road and rail. They have not increased capacity to keep up with demand and have failed to achieve their targets, letting down the travelling public in a spectacular manner. Under a succession of incompetent Ministers, the Department for Transport has been excessively timid and cautious. That is compounded by the fact that we are now Waiting for Gordot. We know that the Chancellor is floundering in his search for tax revenues, and my fear is that the Treasury, which was the chief sponsor of the Eddington report, sees road pricing as a future gold mine. The Chancellor already has his man in the Department for Transport, for the Secretary of State is effectively a sleeper waiting to be woken by the great clunking fist.
	On page 175 of the main report, Eddington specifically warns of the dangers of delay. He points out that
	pricing of this scale is not to be found anywhere else in the world
	and that
	there is currently insufficient evidence to be able to identify what the 'right' option should be.
	He says:
	This uncertainty is not an excuse for doing nothing. Indeed, one of the most serious risks is that government and the private sector scale down their plans for investment on the basis that pricing will reduce the need for additional capacity, but for road pricing not to be delivered. This could result in a severe shortage of transport capacity, resulting in worsening congestion for road users and billions of pounds of cost to the economy.
	We fear that the Government will use Eddington as a shieldan excuse for another nine years of inactivity and tax increases that will be catastrophic for Britain's travelling public. Conservative Members remember that in Samuel Beckett's play the protagonist never arrived. We understand the needs of the travelling public, we understand the misery that the Government are putting them through, we understand what needs to be done, and I urge the House to support our motion.

Stephen Ladyman: The hon. Member for North Shropshire (Mr. Paterson) said that it would be catastrophic if we delayed any further, yet he refuses to commit to a single transport project. The document that the Conservatives have just produced detailing their plans for transport says, in effect: We commit to nothing. We promise nothing. Yet they have the cheek to give us a shopping list of schemes that they wish to imply will be built, having committed to nothing.
	On rail, the hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling) completely overlooked the facts. This Government have invested 8 billion in the west coast main line. We have delivered 44 per cent. more train services on the east coast main line. We have overseen a rise of up to 1 billion passenger journeys a year. We have presided over the fastest growing railway in Europethe railway with the youngest rolling stock fleet in Europe. We have achieved 90 per cent. reliability. We have opened the first phase of the channel tunnel rail link, with the second phase soon to be opened. We have seen a 46 per cent. increase in railway freight since 1997. We have delivered train protection warning systems on the whole network. We have even seen Network Rail delivering a profita profit that goes not into the pockets of the City but back into railway investment. That is what this Government have deliveredyet the Conservatives, who delivered us Railtrack and privatisation, made the channel tunnel rail link a basket case that we had to rescue, and introduced rail policies that led directly to tragedy and the disaster at Paddington have the cheek to criticise us.
	On buses, we now have 2 billion-worth of funding invested in bus services; 400 bus projects supported by the bus challenge competitions; rural bus subsidy grants supporting more than 2,200 rural services, with more than 29 million annual journeys made on them; bus and light railway use up by 8.1 per cent. since 2000-01; 50 per cent. of the bus fleet now accessible to people with disabilities; and some 11 million older and disabled people due to get concessionary fares. All that from this Government, while the Conservatives, who delivered us deregulation, dare to criticise us.
	On roads, we have 39 major trunk roads and motorways completed, with 17 under construction; the M25 being widened to four lanes; active traffic management being delivered to make the best use of the network; regional control centres being built to keep the traffic moving; 1,000 highway officers; real-time traffic information delivered to motorists; road fatalities down; road injuries down; and vehicle excise duty evasion down. All this, and the Conservatives, who gave us the cones hotline, dare to criticise us.
	Did Conservative Members mention that otherkey transport modalityshipsin their motion? Nostrangely, ships have not even been mentioned, despite the fact that the shadow Minister concerned has been sat on the Front Bench for most of the debate. That is hardly surprising, as it is Conservative party that destroyed British shipping and left us without it. The Government have quadrupled the number of ships under the red ensign. Under the Government, the amount of shipping has risen, providing 10 billion in net earnings. Shipping is now the third biggest export earner in the country's economy, thanks to the Government, yet the party that destroyed the red ensign and left the British fleet flagged-out dares to criticise us.
	The shadow Secretary of State says that he wants action, but he will not put his name to anything. His big plan on aviation, according to a document published just a few days ago, is as follows:
	We are studying the different issues carefully and intend to make full use of the time available to us in Opposition to address these issues.
	As he told us just today, his big plan on buses is to wait and see what the Government propose. What is his big plan on trains? That is a good question, because the document hardly mentions trains, except to give the revelation that
	Rail, for example, is essential to carrying commuters into...cities.
	Well, we needed a Conservative think-tank to give us that information. As for his big plan on his big plan, it is to make no specific commitments to any individual transport project until nearer the general election. He promises us nothing, but he demands a great deal.
	The hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Carmichael) did at least admit that Eddington had provided a good analysis, and I agree with him that the Eddington report should be considered in the context of the Stern report. However, he overlooked the fact that the Government have been responsible for major innovations on climate change and transport. The renewable transport fuel obligation, for example, leads the world. He seemed to distinguish between the effects on climate change that result from flights between Scotland and Dubai, which, according to him, are not carbon-emitting, and the effects resulting from flights from London, which seem to be a danger to the environment.

Stephen Ladyman: I will not give way to the hon. Gentleman, as I must make a little progress; when I have done so, I will give way.
	The contribution made by my hon. Friend the Member for Reading, West (Martin Salter) was characteristically understated. Yet again, he refused to tell us what he really thinks about people. He reminded us that the Tories promise big, but deliver very little.He reminded us of the James report and the30 billion-plus cuts in public expenditure that the Conservatives planned to make if they got into power. He reminded us that the shadow Chancellor wants16 billion-worth of growth to be delivered through tax cuts, instead of through investment in public services. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State added to that list the fact that the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond) has said, in the past day or so, that he wants 20 billion-worth of business tax cuts. How will the Conservatives deliver on any of those so-called commitments? How will they deliver on any one of their promises?
	The Government have made 60 per cent. extra investment in transport since 1997, but that is completely overlooked by the Opposition. As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said, the Tories want the ends, but they do not have the will to provide the means. My hon. Friend the Member for Reading, West, told the House about the presentation delivered today on a transport vision for the Thames valley. I assure him that my right hon. and hon. Friends and I will study that carefully. We are happy to engage with it, and to consider how the objectives can be delivered.
	The hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) wants the regional transport structure abolished. He said that he wants decisions on the north-east to be taken not in the north-east, but in my office. That is completely foolish. It is people in the north-east who can best prioritise schemes for the north-east, and that is the system that we have put in place. The Leader of the Conservatives himself has said that he wants fewer decisions to be taken in Westminster, and he wants what he calls real devolution, yet every time that a local, devolved decision is made in the regions or local councils, Conservative Members come to the House and demand that we do not let local people make the decisions, but instead make them in Westminster.
	My hon. Friend the Member for Burnley (Kitty Ussher) pointed out that she can now use the west coast main line, which means that she no longer needs to fly. She pointed out, too, that when the Tories were in power there was no sustained investment. I agree with her that better transport links lead to regeneration and greater economic prosperity, which is why we commissioned the Eddington report and why we take competitiveness and transport seriously.
	The hon. Member for South-West Norfolk (Mr. Fraser) repeated his frequent plea for the final stage of the A11 to be dualled. He is passionate about the issue, having made many representations to me, but he needs to work in the local region to ensure that it gives the scheme the highest possible priority.  [ Interruption. ] It was the local region that decided not to make it its top priority, and while I entirely accept that it is my responsibility to review the regional funding allocation system and make sure that we learn the lessons of the first round of RFAs, it is his duty to make sure that he continues to fight his corner in the local area so that the scheme receives the highest possible priority.
	My hon. Friend the Member for Swansea, East (Mrs. James) made a powerful case, based on problems that she has experienced in her local railway system. The Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, South (Mr. Harris), who is responsible for railways, listened carefully to those problems, and he is happy to discuss the way in which the issue can be progressed. The hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs. Miller) discussed housing expansion and growth. The Conservatives frequently call for transport improvements ahead of growth, but I am afraid that that is not the way in which it works in the real world. We have to provide infrastructure investment in parallel with growth. Those things have to be planned, because they go hand in hand. Her party has said in the past few days that it will not make any promises or commitments, and it does not have any investment to offer in her constituency or any other Conservative constituency. Her call for us to invest more heavily in advance of growth is therefore pure foolishness. She provided a shopping list of requirements, including noise treatment. Under her party's investment plans, there will be only one noise treatment for the roads in her constituencythe issuing of ear plugs to her constituents. My hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith) made a powerful case for improvements to her local system. Again, my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, South, is happy to engage in discussions.
	The hon. Member for North Shropshire (Mr. Paterson) overlooked the fact that throughout the Tories' 18 years in power his party pursued a policy of under-investment and boom and bust economics. When there is no growth in the economy and people's earnings do not go up, transport demand does not go up, which is why transport demand was contained throughout the Opposition's period in office. Since the Government have been in power, there has not been a single quarter in which the economy has failed to grow. We have the fastest growing incomes in Europe, so we have the fastest growing transport problems. During our term in office, 6 million extra vehicles have come on to the roads. There are more people in work, so more people are driving to work or are driving as part of their job, which inevitably puts pressure on the transport system. Despite the huge investments that we have made, including the billions of pounds that we have put into the west coast main line, the railway system and roads, and despite the effort that we have put into all transport modalities, the simple fact of the matterthis is the conclusion that Eddington reachedis that unless we are prepared to face the hard questions, including the challenge of road pricing, it will get worse. Tonight, one Tory spokesman said that the Opposition were in favour of that policy, but the other one completely contradicted him.

Mr. Speaker: Order. I instruct the Serjeant at Arms to find out what is happening in the Aye Lobby, as things seem to be very slow.

Question accordingly negatived.
	 Question accordingly negatived.
	 Question, That the proposed words be there added,  put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 31 (Questions on amendments), and agreed to.
	Mr. Speaker  forthwith declared the main Question, as amended, to be agreed to.
	 Resolved,
	That this House welcomes Sir Rod Eddington's independent report on the impact of transport decisions on economic productivity and growth; accepts his findings that the UK transport network provides the right connections, in the right places, to support the journeys that matter to economic performance, but also that the current unprecedented period of sustained economic growth will continue to place increasing pressures on key sections of that network, and that this needs to be addressed with a wide-ranging strategy encompassing better-use and investment solutions; supports the Government's commitment to taking the decisions which will be required to meet these pressures and put UK transport on a sustainable footing, including tackling the environmental impacts of transport, piloting road-pricing and building on the improvements in rail performance; acknowledges the progress already made through sustained long-term investment and forward planning through the Future of Transport White Paper; and recognises the substantial increases in capacity which this approach has brought, and the continuing programme of investment to provide further increases in capacity and reliability in future.

Mr. Speaker: I have not read  Hansard and therefore do not know what was said, but if an hon. Member is going to attack another hon. Member it is a courtesy and convention of this House that adequate notice is given to allow the hon. Member concerned to come into the Chamber. I would consider adequate notice to be sending a note. I do not wish to get involved in the argument until I see  Hansard, but I give that as a general piece of advice to all hon. Members.

Alan Whitehead: My hon. Friend is right. I shall say a little about credit unions, which do indeed have a very good record for lending at affordable rates.
	The consequence of doorstep lending as I have described itand, of course, I exclude credit unions from thatis people getting deeper and deeper into debt, often as a result of a very modest foray into credit, and rapidly reaching a point at which repayment seems out of the question. I can cite two cases of people in my part of the world who have experienced precisely that.
	Mrs. D is a tenant of a housing association based in Hampshire, whichas a number of housing associations are beginning to doactively helped her to manage her debts when they were uncovered. Mrs. D. is a single mother with four children. She receives income support, tax credit and child benefit, but she took out an initial loan of 500 from a doorstep lending company to buy household appliances and things for her children. The first loan cost her 2,500 to pay back, and the next loan that she took outalso of 500cost 3,000 to pay back. When her smallest child was born, she went to another company for a third loan, which cost 4,500 to repay. The loan companies collecting her repayments on the doorstep pressed her to pay that money instead of her rent, and she rapidly went into substantial arrears. She could see no way out of her spiralling debt, and became depressed and suicidal. She was eventually rescued by the intervention of her landlord, the housing association, which helped her with benefits and arranged for her to pay the money back at a reduced rate; but she will be paying it back for a number of years.
	Three years ago a disabled lady called Sheila, also in my part of the world, opened the door to a friendly-looking gentleman who offered her a loan of a few hundred pounds. She took out a 200 loan, but the amount owed soon expanded to more than 5,000. She then found herself subject to threats of physical violence, and even threats to destroy her wheelchair. She was helped by a community organisation, the South Coast Money Line, which lent her enough money to repay her debt at a manageable rate of interest. She has now repaid the whole amount.
	Those examples are not isolated, and do not exaggerate the depths of misery that unregulated interest rates on small loans collected on doorsteps can bring about, especially as their destinations are often people with no resources with which to extricate themselves from the trap in which they find themselves. They certainly have no access to the consumer credit choices that are available to most of the population.
	That observation is why I give two cheersbut not yet threefor the various measures that have been undertaken, or are being undertaken, in this field. The Consumer Credit Act 2006 introduces an unfair credit test that makes it easier for people to take unfair lenders to court, but many people in the position I have described would no sooner take lenders to court than they would fly to Mars. The Competition Commission has just published proposals that will go some way towards ensuring transparency in doorstep lending, with comparative rates posted on the internet and lenders required to spell out the annual costs of loans, but many doorstep borrowers will not have access to the internet and will not have the credit rating or the mobility to shop around for loans, so the man on the doorstep will still have a monopoly in respect of them.
	The Government have allocated 35 million from the financial inclusion fund to assist in the expansion and administration of credit unions and community development financial institutions. I come now to the important points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend (Mrs. Moon). I consider the development of credit unions and CDFIs to be very important. Credit unions are a quietly expanding success in the field of small loans; they have twice as many members as they had in 2003. However, they suffer from a lack of ability to finance the funds that they will advance for loans, and in most instances they require people to be regular savers with the union before small loans will be advanced.

Alan Whitehead: My hon. Friend gives us an example of commendable action by a housing association. It is important to address overcoming the problem of credit unions having the money to loan to people even if they have not previously been savers with the credit unions. In terms of the organisation of credit unions, it is generally true that there must be a community of both haves and have-nots to fund them: those who are investing because they want them to work and those who are saving because they want to avail themselves of a loan at some stage.
	When they work, they make an enormous difference. A typical loan of 250 from a credit union over 26 weeks would be repayable at 10.18 per week, which is 135 cheaper than a typical, but not top-end, doorstep lending company. So I hope that the 35 million will go some way towards enabling credit unions to play a far wider role in terms of small loans, and particularly in advancing loans without a saving requirement first. I know that the Commission on Unclaimed Assets is looking into the possible use of unclaimed assets in the banking system partly to assist with that kind of funding. It is important that the funds are there for credit unions to lend from, and this could be an important route to achieving that.
	I would like to see, as is the case in a number of other countries, a basic bank entitlement introduced to the UK banking system, just as there is a basic service obligation on utilitiesa basic account not for borrowing, but so that money can be administered by people with sparse means without recourse to the cheque advances, the pawnshop or the doorstep lender.
	If this raft of measures comes inin the case of the Competition Commission's proposals, that will not happen for another two yearsthe landscape will be brighter for people needing small loans in the way I have described. So it may well be the case that many of the problems I have described will eventually begin to be overcome, but why not tackle the issue head-on and regulate the amount of interest that may be charged on the doorstep in the first place? Taken in conjunction with the good and important measures that I have described, we would certainly have the change of terrain that we need, and at an early stage.
	I am not the first person to make this suggestion, either in this Chamber or elsewhere. It is, for instance, a central suggestion of the National Housing Federation, which is undertaking a great amount of work in this field, and of the debt on our doorstep campaign. The Government have to date not warmed to the idea that interest rates should be regulated. The most recent Competition Commission report did not endorse the idea. It is argued with some force that regulation might make things worse for borrowers by driving the legitimate and reputable doorstep lenders out of business and leaving the market to illegal and criminal usurers.
	It is reasonable to seek to ensure that doorstep lending companies can make a living and can take properly into account the overheads with which they work, but there is compelling evidence that the present lending arrangements go well beyond that requirement. The priority, therefore, should be to look at ways in which lending rate regulation can work with the grain of good lending companies and not against them, rather than throwing the baby of indebtedness out with the bath-water of financial regulation.
	A fruitful way of approaching this issue that I certainly endorse, as put forward by the National Housing Federation, is to look at capping in terms of the total credit charge of the loan, rather than the annual percentage rate for the loan, as we more normally do. Since most loans are for short periodsless than 35 weeksthe issue for the borrower is knowing what the overall sum borrowed is, including all repayments. A limit on the total credit charge for short-term loans of, say, 44 per cent. of the principal sum loanedand of perhaps 69 per cent. of the principal sum loaned for longer-term loanswould ensure that reputable companies could stay in business and keep repayments to a higher but manageable amount. It would also establish a transparent context for the loan, and information on alternatives could be provided.
	The proposal would allow reputable companies to stay in business because, calculated in that way, all of Provident Financial's business would be unaffected and it would be able to manage its loan structure within these limits. It is companies closer to the limits of legality, which charge the astronomical rates that I have mentioned, that would feel the heat of the changeand frankly, about time, too.
	I hope that my right hon. Friend the Minister and the Government therefore feel able to look at such a proposal in a different light than hithertonot as a cap that prevents lending or drives people underground, but as a cap that provides, as in a number of other countries with such an arrangement, an honourable place for fair lending on the doorstep, and no place for those who effectively suck the life-blood out of the victims to whom they lend via their own front doorstep. That is, after all, the direction of travel of the very welcome reforms heralded by the Consumer Credit Act 2006, the funding for credit unions and the Competition Commission's proposals. A cap on the total charge for credit would be the star on the Christmas tree of a better way forward.
	What I wantI am sure that this aim is shared by all Membersis successfully to replace what almost amounts to mediaeval usury with a modern and fair approach to lending. People need to borrow, and those in the positions that I have described tonight willoften need to do so in gravely disadvantageous circumstances. We should seek to ensure that fair lending on the doorstep helps to solve the problems they have borrowed in order to address, rather than adding, sometimes irretrievably, to them.

Ian McCartney: First, in the traditional but a sincere way, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test(Dr. Whitehead) on securing this topical and timely debate. I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend (Mrs. Moon) on her intervention supporting credit unions, particularly her own, which has helped those who have suffered at the hands of Farepak. I shall return to that issue on Thursday and give further information to Members and to you, Mr. Speaker, on the final arrangements for assistance in the form of a good-will gesture to help those people through Christmas.
	I want also to put it on record that I am a member of my local credit union and in fact helped to set it up;my membership number is 16. It has grown to a membership of more than 2,000 in the past decade. So I come to the House not just with knowledge of the issues raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test, but empathising with them. If time does not allow me to deal with all the issues that he raised, both intellectually and politically, I undertake to write to him and to my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgend and to place that response in the Library for Members to consider.
	As my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test noted, it was only last week that the Competition Commission published its report on home credit. I very much welcome the work that the commission has done in investigating this market, and its producing recommendations on how to make it work better for consumers. Home credit lenders lent about 1.3 billion to 2.3 million customers in 2005. Most home credit loans are for small sums paid in cash, and 70 per cent. are for less than 500. As my hon. Friend said, people who take out home loans are more likely to be young women with families, living in a low-income household in housing rented from a local council or housing association.
	There is no doubt that the home credit industry fulfils a real need for small, short-term loans. Research shows that customers are generally very satisfied with the service that they get from home credit lenders. However, because such borrowers include many who may be vulnerable and who have no alternatives in obtaining credit, it is particularly important that the home credit industry should be fair, competitive and organised in a transparent way for the benefit of those who borrow from it.
	There have long been concerns that that is not the case and that the charges for that form of credit are excessive. Those concerns led the National Consumer Council to make a super-complaint to the Office of Fair Trading, which in turn referred the industry to the Competition Commission, which reported last week.
	The commission found that there was indeed a lack of competition in the market, whether from other credit products, new entrants to the market or among existing home credit providers. That means that customers are paying higher prices for their loans than would be expected in a competitive market. The commission found that, overall, home credit customers paid 75 million a year more than they should have. That is a matter that should concern all of us, because those customers are the people who can least afford to pay such high prices.
	The report sets out four measures to increase price transparency and promote competition in the market. The commission will require lenders to share data on customers' payment records with other lenders. As my hon. Friend noted, lenders will be required to publish details of their prices on a website, and ensure that the terms for early settlement of home credit loans are fairer.
	As part of the implementation of the Consumer Credit Act 2006, we will require lenders to give borrowers a yearly loan statement, which will have to include the original loan amount, the interest rates for the statement period, the start date and remaining term of the loan, the opening balance, payments made, debits and closing balance. The competition has recommended that for home credit loans the statement should also give the total cost of the loan and should tell borrowers that they are entitled to settle the loan early, and that they can contact the lender to find out how much that would cost. It should also inform borrowers about the price information website and that they can obtain additional statements from the lender.
	We shall look carefully at that recommendation, alongside the responses to our consultation on the proposed statements, which has just closed. In the meantime, I can tell the House that I believe that it is very important to ensure that customers have clear information about their rights and about the remedies when things do not work out.
	My hon. Friend suggested that the Government should go beyond the remedies that the Competition Commission concluded are appropriate to address the adverse effect on competition that it found in the market. We introduced wide-ranging reforms of competition law in the Enterprise Act 2002. Among the main aims of the reforms were to take politics out of competition decisions and to provide for more transparent and accountable decision making by the competition authorities. We established the commission and the OFT as independent competition regulators, so I cannot second-guess the commission's conclusions and introduce further measures before the remedies it identified, after long and careful consideration and consultation, are put to the test. To do so would go against the aims of the Act, but I recognise what my hon. Friend said: we might take politics out of competition but we cannot take politics out of poverty.
	My hon. Friend proposed interest rate caps of44.24 per cent. on loans of less than 35 weeks and of 69.26 per cent. on loans of more than 35 weeks. I am not sure why the amounts are so precise or what their effects would be, but perhaps we can talk about that at a later date. When the commission carried out its investigation, it gave careful consideration to whether a cap on interest rates should be imposed in the home credit sector. It consulted widely on that proposed remedy but concluded that it was not the right way forward.
	We also thought carefully about the matter during our review of consumer credit legislation and commissioned research into the effectiveness of interest rate ceilings. Like the Competition Commission, we are not convinced that introducing interest rate ceilings will help the consumers they are supposed to protect. I am particularly concerned about the fact that if access to home credit was less easy, it might force many vulnerable consumers to use inappropriate products, or even to go outside the regulated market and end up at the mercy of illegal loan sharks, which evidence shows is a real risk.
	The research we commissioned looked at the impact of interest rate ceilings in a number of countries. In France and Germany, where there were interest rate caps, vulnerable consumers had less access to legitimate lenders and twice as many consumers admitted to borrowing from illegal moneylenders as in the United Kingdom.
	Consumers benefit from a competitive market offering choice, where information is available to enable them to make the right choices. The commission decided that we should set out to achieve such a market. None the less, the commission and the Government said that we will keep the issue under review. I welcome this important opportunity to ask my hon. Friends the Members for Southampton, Test and for Bridgend to submit any relevant evidence, which will be dealt with effectively in any subsequent review.
	My hon. Friend suggested that it is not enough to require only larger home credit lenders, with more than 60 agents or a 2 million turnover, to share data within nine months. He suggested that a wider, faster introduction of data sharing is needed to help borrowers build a suitable credit rating. As I said before, the Competition Commission has considered that. There are costs to lenders in getting data into the right format and setting up the systems needed to exchange data with credit reference agencies. That should be introduced in a way that is effective for customers, ensuring that there is no excuse for the industry.
	My hon. Friend believes that the website proposed by the commission is a good idea, but is concernedthat the most vulnerable lenders have limited internet access and may have problems understanding the information. Finance is not an easy subject to understand, which is why I am so supportive of the measures being developed by the national strategy for financial capability, led by the Financial Services Authority. They include making financial education part of the school curriculum, providing financial education in further and higher education, rolling out seminars for employees in the workplace and providing information packs for parents.
	I also recognise something else. To tackle the clear inequality of access to the internet, we have invested in bringing the internet into every community. There are now more than 6,000 UK online centresplaces where people can access the internet in a safe, secure environment and where they can receive technical support and training. UK online centres have targeted areas where they are likely to have the most impact on inequality. They operate in all 88 neighbourhood renewal areas and in 2,000 deprived wards in England and Wales. Centres are in diverse venues, ranging from community centres to libraries, colleges and cyber cafs. Some 95 per cent. of household are within 5 km of a centre and virtually all households in the United Kingdom are within 10 km of a UK online or learndirect centre. My hon. Friend is correct: there is an issue, but I hope that he can see that we are actively engaged in ensuring that there is no inequality in access to the internet and the capacity to use it effectively.
	I said that there would be a serious risk of driving more people to use loan sharks if we put interest rate caps on. However, we are committed to tackling loan sharks. It is often some of the most vulnerable and excluded who fall prey to illegal moneylenders, so we have been funding pilot projects in Birmingham and Glasgow to investigate the impact of strong enforcement against those moneylenders. We have invested 2.6 million over two years in the project. Both pilots are performing well and prosecutions have already been secured in the midlands and Scotland, with more to follow.
	Over the years, my constituency has been bedevilled by illegal loan sharks, who terrorise individuals and communities. They have no place in our communities, or on our streets or doorsteps. Such prosecutions and subsequent ones will send a clear message that there is no hiding place for those people. They do not own or control our communities and we want them out of them. They inflict misery on families and communities, particularly the elderly and other vulnerable people who are their targets, such as single mothers on benefits, those with drug and alcohol addiction, and people with mental health issues.
	Just last week, my hon. Friend the Economic Secretary and I announced a further 1.2 million of funding for the projects. That will mean that the two existing teams will be able to continue for another year and will be able expand their operations into other areas where there is evidence of illegal loan sharks operating: for example, Liverpool, Sheffield and west Yorkshire. At the same time, I published a research report into the scope and extent of illegal moneylending and I will send my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test a copy. That, along with the evaluation of illegal moneylending pilots, will give us the best way forward after 2007-08.
	I welcome the fact that my hon. Friends the Member for Southampton, Test and for Bridgend welcomed the continuing growth of credit unions. They are an important source of affordable and secure loans. One of the important ways in which we have been seeking to provide people with access to such loans is through the promotion of the credit union sector. Credit unions offer an affordable source of credit for those on low incomes and/or those who are financially excluded and cannot get bank loans. We have invested 36 million from the financial inclusion fund for work on boosting the credit union movement in deprived areas in England, Scotland and Wales.
	The credit union movement, however, is patchy throughout the country. As my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test has quite rightly indicated, it needs a larger capital base to grow and become sustainable. The pilot projects are all about finding the most appropriate way of building a base and sustaining it. The selected credit unions were chosen to take part in the exercise on that basis. I hope that the projects will underpin the financing of loans for the poor in our communities in future years. It is absolutely right that people like ourselves should be part of the credit union movement; not to borrow, but to invest so that others can afford to borrow, while being dealt with fairly and sympathetically.
	Consumers benefit from competition, but we must also make sure that the market is fair. Competition on its own will not deliver that, so we need to ensure that lenders are regulated effectively. The Government are in the process of implementing the Consumer Credit Act 2006, which is the final step in a wide-ranging reform of consumer credit regulation. The Act will improve consumer rights and redress. It will also improve the regulation of consumer credit businesses and establish a fair and competitive framework for consumer credit agreements.
	Two aspects of the new Act are especially relevant to our debate. From April, we will be giving consumers the right to challenge an unfair credit relationship. We have deliberately not defined unfair so that the courts will be able to take account of all aspects of a credit relationship when deciding whether it is fair or not. That will include a consideration of what happened before and after a credit agreement was reached, as well as the terms of the agreement itself. We will also be giving borrowers the right to take their complaints to the Financial Ombudsman Service, which will mean that they will not have to face the cost and hassle of a court process to get their cases resolved. That represents a major step forward, so I hope that hon. Members will help to promote the purposes behind the new proposals.
	I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test for giving us the opportunity to debate this important topic. I believe that the changes that the Competition Commission is bringing forward and those under the Consumer Credit Act 2006 will result in more competition, better value and greater rights for home credit customers. I assure him that we will be looking carefully at the impact that they have in practice to ensure that that is the case.
	The Treasury's 120 million financial inclusion fund includes 45 million for the funding of a free face-to-face debt advice service in England and Wales over the financial years 2006-07 and 2007-08. Ithas also meant that we have been able to develop16 partnerships throughout England and Wales to ensure that new debt advisers are added to those already in the system. We are building capacity and opportunity. Over the next two years, approximately 100,000 people will be helped through the new programme. The majority of those 100,000 clients will be the very people about whom my hon. Friend spoke so eloquently this evening. We are both in the same ball park and heading in the same direction.
	We are also heading in the same direction on our desire to ensure that there is equal access to financial services products. It might well be that other things will have to be done in future yearsI do not rule that out. However, I do rule out any continuing opportunity for loan sharks to prey on our people. I give the House a commitment and assurance that the work that we are doing through the pilots will help us to go a long way towards addressing the problems that my hon. Friend outlined. The evidence that he gave us was not about people operating in a regulated marketplace, but about people who were acting as illegal moneylenders. The local police and trading standards authorities have an important role in addressing such people. Those moneylenders prey on people because they believe that they will be too frightened to speak up and speak out, but we can do the speaking up and speaking out for them. Every illegal moneylender whom we bring to court, prosecute and send to jail is another nail in the coffin of those who prey on people in our communities.
	I thank my hon. Friend for raising these issues with me. I will review  Hansard tomorrow and, if necessary, I will write to him. In any event, I will send him the details and information that I outlined. I hope that he will accept what I have said in good faith and that he understands that the action that we are trying to take is along the lines that he suggests. I assure him that we will get there in the end.
	 Question put and agreed to.
	 Adjourned accordingly at six minutes to Eleven o'clock.